


Fake It 'Til You Make It

by A_dot_BUDDY



Category: Hamilton - Miranda
Genre: #WashingtonForPresident2k20, Alternate Universe - Politics, Denial of Feelings, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Fake Marriage, Fake/Pretend Relationship, Light Angst, M/M, Political Campaigns, Slow Burn, Sort Of, Unrequited Love, and, because politics aren't the focus, but not for jamilton, for jamilton its, unrequited jeffmads
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-10-04
Updated: 2021-01-17
Packaged: 2021-03-07 17:00:34
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 38,583
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26821036
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/A_dot_BUDDY/pseuds/A_dot_BUDDY
Summary: Alexander had really thought becoming a part of Washington's presidential campaign team would be his big break in politics. He was fully qualified to be a member of Washington's staff- he had the connections, the talent, the experience, you name it. But due to a fatal fluke in the system, the one thing he didn't have was his citizenship.But Alexander Hamilton has never let anything hold him back from his ambitions before and he's not about to start now. He's willing to do anything-even marry his worst enemy- to secure his position.
Relationships: Aaron Burr/James Madison, Alexander Hamilton/Thomas Jefferson, Gilbert du Motier Marquis de Lafayette/Hercules Mulligan, Thomas Jefferson/James Madison
Comments: 57
Kudos: 159





	1. Get over yourself, Hamilton, it's a negotiation

**Author's Note:**

> DISCLAIMER: Believe me, I am completely and somewhat painfully aware that in so many ways this fic does not depict the way the government actually works. I manipulated it for the sake of the plot, but please please don’t take this as a factual representation because it’s very much not.

In the privacy of his office, in a rare moment where he wasn’t putting any particular effort into his work, Alexander reclined in his office chair. Well, maybe to say he was reclining wouldn’t be precisely accurate. To say he was reclining would suggest at least some degree of relaxation.

Sure, being the primary speechwriter and unofficial right hand man of a presidential candidate like Washington didn’t come without its fair sure of pressure and anxiety. But he excelled at working under pressure and had these anxieties more than under control. That wasn’t what had him so distracted by nerves that he couldn’t even focus on the half typed speech his laptop screen was currently displaying.

Washington’s campaign was going extremely well. It was remarkably difficult for his opponents to find anything to criticize about him, regardless of any political differences they may have had. There was no dirt to dig up- his record was completely clean as far as anyone could tell- and despite being the Democratic nominee, he was remarkably nonpartisan, vowing to represent the interests of each citizen equally, regardless of political affiliation. Alexander had no doubt that he was going to win, if only because the current president, who was currently running for reelection- George Frederick, or “King George” as he was mockingly dubbed- was so widely disliked. 

Alexander was sure that being a part of such a successful campaign could be exactly what he needed to get his start in politics. And with his close- strictly professional, of course, regardless of how paternal Washington acted sometimes- relationship with the nominee, Alexander was reasonably confident that he could expect a cabinet position upon Washington’s election. 

In other words, everything seemed to be falling into place for him career-wise. What, then, had him so anxious he couldn’t even find it in himself to focus on the speech he needed to write for an upcoming rally? Well, as it turned out, there was one thing that absolutely could keep him from his promising career, regardless of his connections, his qualifications, and his merit.

When he’d worked as a lawyer, it had been, if not easy, at least straightforward for him to obtain a work visa. And when he’d been hired to join Washington’s campaign team, he’d been ecstatic to leave his old job and dive headfirst into politics. He’d known he’d have to reapply for the visa because of his change in employment, but he hadn’t thought it was a big deal and had jumped on board with Washington without a second thought.

But now, someway, somehow- maybe he’d said something wrong in the interview? It didn’t matter. The point was his application had been rejected. And he was only finding out now. Now that it was too late to keep his old job a bit longer, or too late to do much of anything really. Whatever mistake he had made, it had just killed his career. He’d planned to rush the naturalization process as much as possible, so he could become a citizen in time to be chosen for Washington’s cabinet. But now, facing this rejection, there seemed to be no way that could happen.

If he was not only not a citizen, but also without a valid work visa, Washington would cut him loose the moment he stepped foot into the White House, maybe even sooner. He wouldn’t want to, but it would simply be unavoidable.

And that wasn’t even mentioning the scandal it would cause if anyone found out about this. It was no secret that he was being considered for Treasury Secretary and if even a rumor got out that he was getting the job when he wasn’t even a citizen- well, he didn’t like to think about the consequences both he and Washington would face. Suffice it to say, he needed to fix this as immediately and secretly as he possibly could.

He’s not going to panic or freak out. He isn’t. There’s a solution somewhere and he’s going to find it. He supposed he could always reapply for his work visa. But he didn’t know what had gone wrong with his application last time, and so he wouldn’t know what to do differently this time around.

He could always get married, he supposed. He wasn’t actually in a relationship, so of course it wasn’t ideal, but he could probably find a friend who’d be willing, as uncomfortable as he was asking a favor as large as this one, especially when the reality of their relationship would need to be kept totally secret, ideally just between the two of them.

John and Eliza were the first two to be crossed off his list, both being his exes. He loved the both of them dearly, but not as anything more than friends at this point and it would be rather unbelievable to say that he got back together with either of them. And of course Eliza being off the table meant that the other two Schuylers were equally unavailable. Even just him dating either of them after Eliza would be completely out of the question, not even to mention marrying them. And of course, Lafayette and Hercules weren’t an option either, being happily together. Who else was he friends with? Or even acquaintances at this point, he’d take what he could get. Burr crossed his mind for a split second before he immediately dismissed the thought. No one would believe he was in a relationship with Burr of all people. Plus, he was pretty sure there was something going on between him and the wife of that Prevost guy in President Frederick’s cabinet. 

So, to make a long story short, he was entirely out of options. Well, shit.

Almost mindlessly, Alexander got up from his place at his desk and made his way out of his office, ignoring the interns and employees that he passed. Having come no closer to finding a solution, he was making his way to the break room, thinking maybe a cup of coffee might clear his mind.

Just as he was about to step into the break room, Jefferson apparently found it prudent to choose that exact moment to bluster carelessly through the doorway, swaggering out of the room in a ball of magenta wrapped arrogance without a care for the presence or wellbeing of others. Or at least that was how Alexander chose to interpret the situation. Regardless of anyone’s interpretation, Jefferson didn’t slow or stop when he saw Alexander in the way, forcing him to practically jump sideways in order to avoid a head on collision, an action Alexander performed with a furious glare fixed on his face.

“Watch it, shortstack,” came Jefferson’s predictably smug remark, as if he hadn’t been the one to all but push Alexander aside so rudely. Alexander wasted no time in rushing to catch up with Jefferson, completely forgetting his intentions of getting coffee as he began walking beside him just so he could chew him out. 

“What the fuck, you entitled prick, just because you have an ego the size of a planet doesn’t mean you get to just-” Alex froze mid sentence, stopping midsentence as an idea came to him. A terrible, awful, yet oddly perfect idea.

Jefferson had a fairly unimportant job on the campaign team, all things considered. While he was technically in a management position, he didn’t do or oversee anything genuinely important or have any opportunity to be influential.Washington agreed with almost none of his positions or ideas, and therefore he was largely pushed to the side and disregarded by Washington. He had little to no chance of being chosen for any position of importance in Washington’s cabinet.

Alexander, on the other hand, had a large amount of influence and he knew for a fact he held a large amount of Washington’s trust. He could convince Washington that Jefferson was worthy of consideration, and in return, Jefferson could marry him, thereby granting him his citizenship. 

“Holy shit,” Alexander said, aware it would appear largely out of context in Jefferson’s eyes. But for now he just dead stopped in the middle of the hall, struck by the fact that he now had a potential solution to work towards. And work towards it he would. He would do anything it took to keep his career intact. Up to and including begging his nemesis to marry him.

“You alright there, Hamilton?” Jefferson asked as he slowed to a halt himself and turned to face him, though his tone was anything but actually caring. He was looking at him with mild concern and with major judgement.

“Yeah, fine, great even,” Alexander replied quickly, forgetting even to act antagonistic in his rush to smooth things over. Though he supposed acting antagonistic wasn't exactly the way to go if he wanted something from Jefferson. 

“Uh huh,” Jefferson responded skeptically, looking at him with clear and open disbelief.

Alex didn’t know how to respond to that, or how to somehow steer this conversation in a direction that would make Jefferson see him in a positive enough light to consider listening to what he had to say. Eventually, he figured screw it, Jefferson already didn’t like him and that wasn’t about to change. He wasn’t about to let the awkward silence linger or allow Jefferson the time to walk away from him, so he just blurted out his statement, “I have a proposition for you.”

“Do you?” Jefferson asked, obviously surprised, though he quickly recovered enough to turn it into an opportunity to antagonize him, “Is the great Alexander Hamilton stooping so far as to request a favor from a plebeian such as myself?”

“Oh fuck you, don’t act like I’m the elitist one. I’m not the one who prances around the office in thousand dollar shirts, primping and preening as if throwing around your connections and piles of money will make up for your shitty views and your even shittier personality,” here Alexander paused, checking to make sure he was getting a reaction out of Jefferson, who just looked vaguely unimpressed, like he was just waiting for Alexander to be finished speaking. Of course, this lack of reaction only served to make him more angry. But alas, he still had to get Jefferson to agree to his proposition, so it probably wasn’t the best idea to take these insults much further.

“But yes, as it so happens, I need a favor,” Alexander admitted after a short pause. Jefferson just snorted at the response, gratified at being right.

“And why on earth would I do a favor for you?” Jefferson asked. A fair enough question, considering anything positive for Alex amounted to a negative for Jefferson.

“I’ll do you a favor in return,” Alexander said instantly.

“As if I’d want anything from you,” Jefferson scoffed, an immediate rejection.

“Not even a promotion?” Alexander asked him testily.

“What?” came his predictably disbelieving response, in obvious shock at the sort of offer being posed to him.

“Well of course I couldn’t give it to you directly. But don’t try and tell me you’re happy in a job with a fancy title but no real power. I can put in a word with Washington, get him to stop dismissing you out of hand. Maybe, if you manage to reign in your idiocy for long enough, he might even bring you into his cabinet after he’s elected,” Alexander told him, obviously trying to make the offer sound as intriguing as possible.

Thomas seemed to be processing those words. Hopefully he was deciding that Washington’s attention was worth it and resolving to agree to Alexander’s request, though Alexander obviously couldn’t know for sure.

“You must be pretty desperate, huh?” is what Jefferson eventually said, “Asking me for help? Thinking there’s any chance I’d say yes? I wonder how pitiful your circumstances must be for you to come begging for my assistance.”

Alexander bristled at that, taking immediate offense, “Who said anything about begging? I’m making you an offer and I’m more than happy to take it back.”

“Take it back then,” Jefferson challenged, calling his bluff.

Alex faltered at that, not willing to fully rescind the offer so immediately. Despite what he’d said, he didn’t exactly have a back up plan. The pause was just long enough for Jefferson to jump to whatever conclusions he was jumping to and for a smirk to appear on his face.

“That’s what I thought,” Jefferson said smugly, his infuriating smirk only growing as he spoke.

“Believe me, Jefferson, I’d rather be doing quite literally else besides having this conversation with you, but I-”

“Save it,” Jefferson said, and Alexander glared sharply at him for interrupting, “Why don’t we have this conversation over dinner? For now, shocking as the concept may be to you, I have actual work to do.”

“Oh as if anything you do is even important, I’m sure you can make time for one conversation-”

“No, I can’t.”

Alexander just continued on as if he hadn’t even heard him, “Besides, dinner sounds more like a date than a discussion of business.”

“Get over yourself, Hamilton, it’s a negotiation,” Jefferson told him. Alex just scoffed in response.

“I’ll text you my address, be there at seven sharp,” Jefferson told him, beginning to continue walking to his office as though Alexander had even agreed to this.

“You don’t have my number and no way in hell I’m giving it to you,” Alexander called after him, not moving to follow.

“I’ll email it then,” Jefferson called back, not even bothering to glance back at him as he responded, simply walking the rest of the way to his office and closing himself inside seemingly without a second thought.

Alexander momentarily stood rooted to the spot, processing what had just happened. That hadn’t been exactly ideal considering he didn’t even get to tell Jefferson his proposition. But Jefferson was also giving him the chance to explain himself, which was more than he’d expected. Either that or he planned to reject him and was simply inviting him to dinner so he could milk the opportunity to reject Alexander and to have power over him for all it was worth.

At the very least, it felt like he was actually doing something now and putting in effort to fix his situation rather than just waiting for it to blow up in his face. Well, regardless of whether this worked out, he had left his office for one thing and one thing alone, and that thing was coffee. He turned back around and retraced his steps to the breakroom.

At least now he had some time to actually plan out what he was going to say rather than a spur of the moment insult filled rant. If anything, putting off this conversation was only making it more likely for Alexander to come out on top.

~~~

Thomas was dramatically slouched in the chair across from James’ desk, mourning the situation he’d gotten himself into. James, for his part, wasn’t being particularly sympathetic, merely finishing up what he was typing on his laptop before turning to give his full attention to Thomas..

“Don’t you think you’re being a little dramatic?” James asked him, finally closing his laptop as he did so.

Of course Thomas didn’t think he was being ‘a bit dramatic’. Sure, maybe the moment Hamilton was out of sight of his office he’d practically snuck away, so as to avoid encountering him in the hallway again. And maybe he'd come straight here, to James’ office, in order to complain about his own poor life choices, but to be fair they were, in this particular case, exceedingly poor. For some godforsaken reason, he’d willingly invited Hamilton into his home and now he had to deal with the consequences. 

“I’m having dinner with Hamilton tonight. In my own home,” he repeated his thoughts out loud instead of directly answering the question. In his opinion, this fact answered the question well enough on its own, no explanation needed. Of course it wasn’t being dramatic to be upset about that.

“Cancel then, if you don’t want to do it,” James told him, sounding for all the world like this was a reasonable option.

“I can’t just cancel. That’s the same as backing down,” Thomas told him stubbornly. He’d already sent the email giving Hamilton his address and reiterating the time. He couldn’t exactly send a follow up email that said anything along the lines of ‘nevermind’ after he’d been so insistent on this measure.

James just sighed in response, obviously not having the same level of personal stake in the rivalry as Thomas did, “ Well then, how bad can it be? You’ll cook something, he’ll tell you his proposal over dinner, you’ll turn it down flat and send him home after dinner.”

There James went again, making everything sound so simple, “It won’t be that easy. I’ve given him time to prepare now, I won’t be able to get him to shut up or go away unless I agree, and I don’t intend to agree to anything that would boost his career at the potential expense of mine.”

“From what you’ve told me, it seems like he’s willing to help boost your career to get him out of whatever situation he’s in,” James commented. Though they both knew that Thomas wouldn’t do anything that betrayed his principles even if it did boost his career.

“Maybe. But what if it's a trick somehow?” Thomas didn’t trust Hamilton to not try and get one over on him if he’d found an opportunity to.

James thought for a moment, drumming his fingers lightly on the desk as he did so, “How about this? I’ll join you two for dinner. If it’s a trick at least one of us is bound to catch on to it, and even if it’s not, the meeting will take place in your home and be two against one, so whatever the potential negotiations are, you’ll have the upper hand.”

“That’s.. actually a good idea,” Thomas responded, ignoring it when James rolled his eyes at how surprised Thomas sounded. 

Aside from the reasons James had listed, his presence would also have the obvious added benefit of making Thomas much more comfortable with the whole ‘having Hamilton in his house’ situation.

“Great, I’ll see you at seven, then,” James told him, opening up his laptop again without giving Thomas the chance to respond. But Thomas caught the small smile on his face as he did so, likely from relief that he’d actually been able to calm Thomas’ concerns. Or maybe he was just glad that it was resolved so he could get back to work, Thomas couldn’t read minds. Either way, Thomas grinned back at him.

“See you then,” Thomas agreed, taking the obvious hint and getting up to leave the room. Hopefully, Thomas bringing an unexpected ally to the dinner would be enough to throw Hamilton off his game.

  
  



	2. A mutually beneficial agreement

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much to everyone who commented or left kudos on the last chapter! I didn't respond to every comment since it's hard for me to know what to say in response unless someone asks a direct question, but just know that every comment was appreciated and gave me so much motivation!

Alexander was agitated already and all he was doing was standing outside Jefferson’s door, a bottle of wine held in one hand. But to be fair, it wasn’t like he’d rented a simple apartment like any sensible person would have- they were in New York City, but if all went well with the campaigning, they’d be heading down to DC shortly. So Jefferson had to know that his stay here was temporary. And yet for reasons indeterminable, Alex was standing outside the door of an honest to god good sized top floor penthouse in the middle of the city. He knew Jefferson could afford it, the man owned an entire manor in Virginia for Christ's sake. But still. It felt so frivolous to him and he couldn’t stand it.

Eventually, after almost a minute of mentally talking himself down from a bout of anger, likely caused by stress more than anything, Alexander gathered himself and rang the doorbell, hitting the button perhaps a tad bit more aggressively than necessary.

There was the faint sound of footsteps behind the door and then it was swinging open to reveal Jefferson, looking down at him in a rather unimpressed way. Jefferson was dressed more casually than Alex had perhaps ever seen him, though to be fair he didn’t make a habit of seeing him outside of work if he could help it. And he was still in fairly formal wear, button up and all. He’d simply lost the suit jacket and tie Alexander had gotten used to seeing him wearing. Alexander, who’d come here straight from work, only stopping to pick up the wine first, was almost starting to regret not having changed. Despite being dressed more formally than Jefferson, he was still somehow managing to feel underdressed.

Suddenly realising he hadn’t made a move to say anything or even acknowledge that the door had been opened and that Jefferson was becoming less and less impressed with him, he cleared his throat to speak, trying to muster up something polite to say.

But then he saw Madison emerge from what was presumably the living room, also dressed in his work attire minus the suit jacket, small polite smile on his lips.

“Hello, Alexander,” Madison said, and Alexander completely changed his course.

“What is Madison doing here?” Alexander demanded, whirling on Jefferson accusingly.

And suddenly he had a horrible thought. Jefferson and Madison were so close, they always seemed to be together, were always so in tune with each other. What if they were dating? It’s not like Jefferson would have had any reason to tell Alexander if that was the case, they weren't exactly friends. But if that was, in fact, the case, Alex was screwed all over again.

“I can’t invite a friend over for dinner in my own home?” Jefferson asked innocently, stepping back and gesturing Alexander inside so he wouldn’t just be standing on the steps forever. Alexander reluctantly followed the wordless command, stepping inside so Jefferson could shut the door. So either they weren’t dating or they were just keeping it quiet. Alex had no way to know for sure.

“Invite a friend over for dinner in your own time. I’m here on business,” Alexander said stubbornly, though he allowed Jefferson to easily take the bottle of red wine from his hands.

He was fully expecting Jefferson to make a snide comment on the quality of the wine- he’d grabbed a cheap bottle at random, something that was affordable, not impressive. Red, but not because he’d consciously bought it to go along with any meal. Just because he’d happened to see it almost first. Instead, Jefferson just glanced at the label and brought it down the hall and through a door into the dining room, Madison and Alexander trailing after him like a pair of polarized shadows.

“Business? I was under the impression you were here to beg a favor of me,” Thomas said snidely, beginning to pour a bit of wine into each of the three already set out glasses on the table.

“I wouldn’t beg you for shit,” Alex stated bluntly, watching as Thomas gracefully set each glass in front of an already set place at the table. There were two places side by side and one across the table from them. 

“Here to make a deal then. Have a seat Hamilton,” Thomas instructed him, oddly polite despite the demanding tone. Alexander complied, sitting in the seat across from the two side by side ones, not wanting to sit beside Jefferson or Madison and presuming he wasn’t meant to anyway. 

“A mutually beneficial agreement,” Alexander agreed, shooting Madison a small glare as he quietly took the seat across from him, annoyed simply at the fact that he was still present.

“Sure,” Jefferson said easily, scooping up the empty plates and bringing them into the nearby kitchen, presumably to put food on them. 

Alex spent the time he was waiting for him glaring at Madison, hoping that maybe if his glare was strong enough, Madison would just combust. Or at the very least go away. Madison shifted slightly, like he was considering saying something, but when he was met with the force of Alexander’s glare, seemingly decided against it. It wasn’t like Alex had any particular problem with Madison. Well, he did, but no more problem than he had with any of his political enemies. If anything, he had more of a problem with Jefferson than he did with Madison. But he wasn’t asking Madison to marry him, he was asking Jefferson, and he didn’t want any more witnesses to it than necessary. And in his mind the exact number of necessary witnesses was zero.

Soon enough, Jefferson came back into the dining room with three full plates balanced carefully in his arms, smoothly depositing them in each in their designated place like he’d been waiting tables all his life. Alex was half expecting him to narrate what was on the plate as if he were in a cooking competition, but instead he just took his seat, commenting, “Luckily, the wine you brought should pair nicely with this.”

Alexander just nodded, not knowing much about pairing wines with food. Though he did glance down at his plate. The meal looked beautiful, a small cut of what he assumed was some sort of steak with a sort of mushroom sauce with onions and some asparagus off to the side, all artfully placed. Naturally, Alexander assumed he’d had some sort of personal chef make it. That seemed like another thing Jefferson would have no problem throwing away money on.

Alex picked up his utensils and took a small bite of the meat, hoping in a petty sort of way that it would be terrible, though on the contrary, it was very good, “This is delicious, did you make it?” he asked Jefferson, wanting him to have to say ‘no, it was my chef’.

Instead Jefferson smiled a sort of half smirk half smile, “I did, thank you. Cooking is a hobby of mine.” And Alexander instantly regretted complimenting it. Jefferson’s smirk only grew at the look on Alex’s face, which fed into Alex’s annoyance even more. It was extremely easy to forget that he was supposed to be polite while he was here and that he needed Jefferson to agree to his proposal. He probably looked in pain with how much it took out of him to keep the conversation as polite and neutral as he was able.

Alexander would have been all too happy to let them lapse into uncomfortable silence while he occasionally stabbed the food on his plate with slightly more aggression than necessary, but apparently Jefferson had other ideas, saying, “Now we can make some uncomfortable small talk first if you prefer, but I think we’d all rather get straight to the issue at hand.”

“I’m not talking in front of Madison,” he said promptly, spearing a piece of asparagus as he did so. Madison glanced to Jefferson, obviously unsure of himself, but Jefferson just sighed.

“I’m just going to tell him later, anyways, you might as well just say it now,” Jefferson said, carefully cutting up his own meat, a stark contrast to the way Alexander’s was practically being mauled.

“You can’t tell him at all,” Alex protested.

“I’m going to,” was Jefferson’s immediate retort. Well. At least he was being honest, Alexander supposed.

There were a few more moments of silence that felt oppressive to Alexander, though Jefferson looked completely calm and unbothered. On one hand, he really didn’t want any more people knowing about this than absolutely necessary. On the other, if Jefferson wound up agreeing, he knew Madison would never rat out his best friend. And Madison wasn’t even really speaking up or engaging in the conversation, maybe because of Alexander’s hostility, but still. He seemed for the most part like his intention was to be a silent observer. Alexander still didn’t have a back up plan at this point, so apparently he was just going to have to take even more drastic measures than he’d originally thought. That would have to be fine.

“Fine, I’ll tell you,” Alexander burst out eventually, dropping his utensils onto the table. Jefferson, the smug bastard, just smirked as if he’d known this would happen all along.

“Go on, then,” Jefferson said, motioning for him to speak. Alexander shot both of them another glare merely out of principle before he began to speak.

He began by explaining the problem, how he’d gotten into this situation. He watched their eyebrows raise as they became aware of the sheer amount of power they had over him after being handed this kind of dirt. But he ignored it and plowed on with the explanation, including the risks involved and how desperate he was to fix it, everything he stood to lose, how he could hurt Washington’s campaign as well as kill his own career. It was more than strange to be telling all of this to his two biggest political enemies, but he hadn’t told anyone else and it felt almost cathartic just to be able to say it all out loud to another person. Even if those people were more than likely just going to throw it back in his face and publicize it.

Once he’d filled them in on what had happened up until that point, his eyes landed on his glass of wine. Shrugging to himself slightly, he picked it up and took a few gulps, drinking a bit more at once than he supposed was strictly polite.

Meanwhile Jefferson and Madison still seemed to be wrapping their heads around what he had just told them.

“And how am I supposed to help you with this?” Jefferson asked. He didn’t seem nearly as gratified by his situation as Alexander had expected him to. He seemed to be shocked more than anything.

“Glad you asked,” Alex said, setting the wine glass down with a sardonic sort of smile, “I need you to marry me.”

You could have heard a pin drop in the momentary shocked silence that ensued.

“What?” Jefferson broke the silence, looking at Alexander as if worried he’d totally lost it.

“It sounds crazy, I know, but if you think about it, it’ll make sense. It’ll allow me to become a citizen by the time Washington gets elected, and I’ll get him to give you a chance. It’s a win win situation, it’ll help both of our careers,” Alexander was getting almost desperate in his explanation. This was the part where Jefferson either laughed in his face or he got what he wanted.

“And you thought I’d be the person to come to for this?” Jefferson asked, raising an eyebrow. Alex was starting to get antsy waiting for Jefferson to get over the shock and actually make a decision.

“No, Jefferson, but all of my friends are unavailable for various reasons so I needed to convince someone else to do it. I can help you with your career at little expense to myself, so it was an obvious choice,” he explained.

“How do you know I wouldn’t just blackmail you with this?”

“Because it would hurt Washington’s campaign and you want him as president almost as much as I do,” Alex answered confidently.

Jefferson didn’t say anything else for the moment, lapsing into silence for the moment as he obviously thought about it. It wasn’t until then that Alex thought to glance at Madison to see how he was reacting to all of this. He noted with some surprise that underneath his usual stoic demeanor seemed to be some actual nerves. He might be wrong- he’d never exactly been an expert at reading Madison. But if he was right, why would this be something for Madison to be nervous about?

“I want to talk to James about this before I give you an answer,” maybe it was just his imagination, but did Madison seem calmer upon hearing that?

“Why?” Alex asked, instantly suspicious.

“Because I value his opinion and want to hear what he thinks without you present to counter his every word,” Jefferson retorted instantly. Alexander just shrugged, trying not to start an argument unnecessarily when he needed Jefferson on his side.

“We’ll be in the kitchen. You stay here,” Jefferson told him, getting up from the table and walking out of the room, Madison hot on his heels.

Alex sighed to himself, left to his own thoughts while the enemy conferred. If Madison advised Jefferson to turn him down, he couldn’t imagine Jefferson going against his wishes. They presented such a united front on everything when they were together, though unfortunately for him in this case, it was him they tended to unite against.

He had half a mind to go up to the door and try to eavesdrop, just to try and get a sense of how the conversation was going. The only thing holding him back was the thought of how mortifying it would be to get caught and how it would probably result in them defaulting straight to the blackmail option.

So he just picked his fork back up and started moving the asparagus around the plate, not actually eating it since his appetite was almost nonexistent as a result of nerves, but just trying to take his mind off the situation.

~~~

James followed Thomas into the kitchen, watching as the façade he’d been keeping up in front of Hamilton visibly dropped once they were alone. It wasn’t a major change- more like Thomas going from very deliberately cool and distant to looking more thoughtful.

“You were awfully quiet in there,” Thomas commented, leaning back against one counter as he did so. James just shrugged, remaining standing where he was in the middle of the floor.

“I didn’t know how useful it would be for me to speak up with him glaring at me like that,” he explained, sounding a little more defensive than he had meant to.

“I didn’t mean it as a criticism,” Thomas was quick to clarify, “I just meant I’m curious as to what you think.”

“Don’t do it,” James said instantly, “If you want to know what I think, there it is. Don’t do it.”

“Why?” Thomas asked, eyebrows raising in clear surprise. Probably not at the conclusion he’d come to, but perhaps by how quickly and forcefully he’d come to it.

And James knew he’d relied too much on his emotions, his paranoia to be more specific, in coming to that conclusion. Because logically, he knew that Thomas and Hamilton would never actually end up together, not in the real sense. There was simply too much history for them to overcome. It’d be like trying to mix oil and water.

Though a little voice in the back of James’ head told him that structurally different as oil and water were, all it took to overcome the forces that kept them apart was for them to be shaken hard enough. And if an unexpected career affecting fake marriage wasn’t enough to shake someone up, well, James didn’t know what was.

“Because it can’t be as straightforward as he seems. And you don’t know how long this could be going on for- potentially years! What happens if you meet someone you’d actually want to marry?” Despite the fact that they weren’t his whole reason for being against this scheme, James’ concerns were valid ones.

“I’m pretty sure I’m not gonna have the desire to actually marry anyone anytime soon, James. There’s no one I’m even remotely interested in. And besides, we don’t have to stay married forever, if something came up we could always just divorce,” Thomas countered.

James knew Thomas didn’t have any interest in him, not the same type of interest he had in Thomas, at least. He knew it now and he’d always known it, but that didn’t make it any easier on him when Thomas said that sort of thing. It was irrational. He knew Thomas didn’t consider him that way, so it shouldn't hurt so much when he said it out loud. And yet it did.

Regardless, he accepted that all he’d ever be to Thomas was a friend, albeit a very close one. Because he had to accept it, otherwise he’d lose Thomas altogether, and that wasn’t even an option in his mind.

But that didn’t mean he was willing to sit passively by while his friend got himself hitched to someone who he openly despised and who openly despised him in return. Regardless of his personal stakes in the situation, he felt like it wouldn’t be right to passively agree. Thomas had asked his opinion, he was going to dissuade him if he could.

“Look, I know you’re doing this for your career, but think how damaging it would be if this got out,” he’d definitely be much worse off than before if the public found out he’d entered into a fake marriage in order to try and secure a promotion.

“It won’t get out. Only the three of us know and it’s going to stay that way,” Thomas told him. James didn’t say anything else, but he also didn’t back down, trying to think of another argument he could use.

“But how are you going to-”

“Look, James, I’m sure all the details can be worked out. But what I’m seeing in this situation is a huge opportunity for me to actually get somewhere, do something with my career. Can you at least understand that?”

James sighed, but gave a small nod. Thomas had made up his mind and he didn’t want to be persuaded. His thoughts and feelings of the situation hadn’t been changed in the least, but James was still going to support Thomas, because that was all he could really do, “Just know when something goes wrong, I’m going to be the first to say I told you so.”

“I’m sure you are,” Thomas agreed, grinning at James, who felt his heart flutter and unconsciously gave a small smile in return. He obviously truly saw this as a potentially good opportunity and was grateful that James wasn’t going to begrudge him taking it. He had the feeling he was going to regret this later, but he really couldn’t make himself keep arguing with him about it.

“Alright, go talk to your fiancé then,” James said, raising a joking eyebrow at him, trying to keep the situation as light as he could.

Thomas laughed and agreed, and James found himself trailing behind him once again as they made their way back to the dining room. Sometimes he thought he trailed behind Thomas a bit too often, in more ways than one.

When they arrived back in the dining room, Hamilton jumped to his feet in anticipation of Thomas’ response rather than waiting for them to sit down, leaving them all standing, the meal left mostly forgotten.

“You’re on, Hamilton. I’m in,” Thomas told him without further ado. James watched as Hamilton’s face lit up into a relieved grin, watched as he met Thomas’ eye, watched as Thomas tentatively smiled back.

He knew this moment wouldn’t last long and they’d be back to their arguing and their sarcasm and mutual dislike any minute now. But it didn't stop him observing their interactions with a critical eye.

James began to zone out of the conversation more and more as they began to talk details- they’d exchanged numbers, apparently for the sake of credibility, they’d decided to talk more at the office tomorrow. James felt more and more like he was fading into the background the longer they spoke.

It wasn’t like this one instance of shared scheming was making them get along any better, they still had their insults and their disagreements and their rivalry. But James had a feeling in the pit of his stomach, a bad feeling, like the oil and the water had been placed into the same container and now someone was beginning to shake.

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Again, thank you so much for reading! It means a lot!


	3. I'm really not convinced you've thought this through

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much to everyone who commented or left feedback on the last chapter! I'm not always the best at answering comments, I feel like I'm being awkward, but just know that I appreciate it so much!

Thomas was sitting at his desk with his laptop open in front of him, typing away at a report he’d been told to go over. He didn’t have a lot of say over the contents of the report, a fact he tried hard not to resent, but he’d been doing a fair amount of fact checking and editing. He was planning to finish this up and then take his lunch break.

He was halfway through typing a sentence when he heard the distinctive sound of his door being flung open rather dramatically. Before he even had time to react, his laptop was slammed shut in front of him without his consent. Surprise, surprise, when he looked up, there was Hamilton standing over him and staring down at him smugly, steaming styrofoam coffee gripped tightly in one hand.

“What the hell, Hamilton?” Thomas said irritably, glaring up at him but not bothering to open his laptop again.

“You said we’d talk tomorrow. It’s tomorrow,” Hamilton explained, raising his eyebrows and looking for the world like he actually thought that was a decent excuse. 

“You almost slammed my fingers into my laptop. You could have broken them,” 

Thomas pointed out. And maybe that was a dramatic interpretation of the situation, but that was far from the point.

“Pity I didn’t,” Hamilton replied, unrepentant.

“And you just shut my laptop, what if I hadn’t saved my work?”

“You were using google docs, you’re fine.”

Thomas just sighed in response, apparently having no other issues to bring up and accepting that Hamilton was, for the moment, in his office. Hamilton’s smirk only grew as no response was forthcoming, and he took a large gulp of his coffee before commandeering the other chair in his office, across from his desk, the one usually reserved for James.

“So we’re gonna want to get this done as quickly as humanly possible to avoid any real suspicion when we get closer to the election. I guess what we really need to figure out first is the logistics of everything, but-”

“Woah, woah, woah, Hamilton,” Thomas stopped him, putting up a hand to silence him. Yes, sure, they were going to need to discuss logistics, but all he could think about was the volume Hamilton was speaking at. Meanwhile, Hamilton looked betrayed, like he thought Thomas was about to go back on his agreement.

“Think about how loud you’re speaking and then think about the thickness of these walls,” Thomas told him, raising an eyebrow.

“Oh,” Hamilton said, deflating slightly as he came to the realization that Thomas was right.

“Yeah ‘oh’,” Thomas shot back. Though the more he thought about it, the riskier it seemed to bring up this topic in the office at all, no matter how quiet they were about it, “maybe we should just leave the office to have this discussion.”

“Yeah, maybe,” Hamilton agreed, seeming somewhat uncertain about that. Probably afraid to leave his work. Regardless, Thomas chose to take that as wholehearted agreement.

“Let’s just go get lunch then,” Thomas suggested with a shrug. He’d been planning on taking his lunch break soon anyway, and he doubted Hamilton would have taken his yet, so what could it hurt?

~~~

James knocked on Thomas’ office door, the bag of lunch he’d packed for himself clutched in one hand. They hadn’t specifically planned to have lunch together that day, but they seldom had to discuss it. It was an unspoken agreement between the two of them that unless someone was busy or said otherwise, they’d eat lunch together. Thomas hadn’t said anything about it to James, so James wasn’t expecting any deviation from their routine.

When there was no response, James pushed the door open to see if Thomas maybe just hadn’t heard him, but he was met with a dark and empty office. Well, that was fine. Thomas probably just had a meeting or was in the break room, or any number of things. Well, he wasn’t in the breakroom, James had just grabbed his lunch from there. But the point was he could easily just be busy.

James had no desire to stand in the hallway or sit alone in Thomas’ office waiting for him, but he also didn’t want to eat without him in case he really was just running later than usual. Well, the most likely person to know where he was was George Clinton, his unofficial intern. Clinton wasn’t actually assigned to Thomas, just his department, but he had taken to helping out Thomas in particular. Thomas might have told him if he was doing something important. 

Making the split second decision to go find Clinton, James walked down the hallway to the office shared by the interns in Thomas’ department. He gave a quick knock on the door in warning before pushing it open.

The intern’s office was rather small, with a few people, mostly college kids, crammed into small desks, laptops set up in front of them. James’ eyes landed on Clinton just as he was hurriedly slamming his laptop shut, the last strains of some sort of video game music dying out as he did so. The other interns were averting their eyes and pretending to have had no part in it. 

“Hey, Mr. Madison!” Clinton said, trying to mask his guilt by acting unnecessarily upbeat, hoping James wouldn’t mention what he’d just witnessed.

“Hello, George,” James replied, rolling his eyes at the antics, and choosing not to say anything. Despite how unapproachable he might seem sometimes, he was never too hard on the interns. He figured they had enough to deal with living up to Hamilton and Thomas’ expectations.

“I was just wondering if you happened to know Thomas’ whereabouts?” he asked, watching with some amusement as George visibly relaxed upon realizing he was going to get away with his transgression.

“Oh, he’s probably still out for lunch with Mr. Hamilton,” George replied casually, now starting to spin ever so slightly in his chair, “I can tell him you were looking for him?”

“No, that’s okay, I’ll find him when he gets back,” James told him, managing to keep his tone impassive. Rude as it might have been, he left the room without even a goodbye, though to be fair, his mind was a bit preoccupied at the moment.

He was a grown man. He supposedly had his life together. This wasn’t middle school, he was absolutely not going to fall apart just because his friend ditched him to eat lunch with someone else. Not even if he had strong feelings for that friend and he suspected that friend was on track to developing strong feelings for someone else. 

No. He was going to keep it together. And if suddenly his lunch didn’t seem so appetizing anymore and he ended up dumping it in a trash can on the way to his office? Well, that was neither here nor there.

~~~

“I say we get a quick courthouse wedding and call it a day. We don’t have to make this a big deal,” Hamilton suggested, sort of poking at the sandwich he had ordered. They had gone to a hole in the wall cafe, very out of the way of their office, not wanting to take the chance that someone from work would be dining at the same place as them, although their meals were going largely ignored in favor of the conversation they were having.

“I’m really not convinced you’ve thought this through,” Thomas said rather than actually responding to the suggestion, raising an eyebrow at him.

“What? Of course I have!” Hamilton’s expression immediately hardened into a glare as he leaped straight into defensiveness.

“Really? So you’ve planned for the possibility that this turns into a public affair?” Thomas asked.

“Why would this become a public affair? The entire reason we’re doing this is so it doesn’t,” Hamilton seemed almost suspicious of Thomas, which Thomas of course found ridiculous.

“No. We’re doing this so you can become a citizen. If people start to question your citizenship- well, we’re going to need to make our relationship seem as legitimate as possible so it’s difficult for people to question, which in turn means they can’t use the illegitimacy of our marriage as a weapon in attacking your citizenship,” despite the impressive dedication Hamilton showed to finding a solution to his problem, Thomas was fairly sure that that drive hadn’t extended far enough into the future to plan for potential problems. For now, he was thinking in the short term, working to make sure he wouldn’t lose his job any time in the near future. He wasn’t worrying as much about the future as much as he was worrying about fixing the problem in the present. That was okay. Thomas could worry enough for the both of them.

“Which means-”

“No quiet courthouse wedding,” Thomas finished for him. Hamilton seemed almost to deflate at that.

“This is going to be humiliating,” Hamilton commented, glaring down at his plate grumpily, as if it was the sandwich’s fault that all of this was happening.

“Yes,” Thomas said simply. He couldn’t disagree.

“Well, that doesn’t change that we still need to get this done as quickly as possible. What if we told everyone that we’re engaged pretty much immediately, then we can book a venue for the soonest available date?” Hamilton suggested.

“Can I tell my family this is fake?” Thomas asked, seemingly out of nowhere.

“No,” Hamilton replied instantly, brows furrowing at the sudden change of topic, “the less people that know, the better.”

Thomas thought about arguing, but quickly thought better of it. Hamilton hadn’t wanted James to know and look how that had turned out. Uncharacteristically deciding to spare him some anxiety, he figured his family didn’t need to know.

“Then we won’t need to worry about booking a venue. Jeffersons get married at Monticello. They’ll know something’s up if we don’t,” bringing Hamilton home to his family was an entirely unappealing prospect, but the only way he could think of to avoid suspicion.

Hamilton’s face instinctively screwed up in distaste, “Great, so I have to get married in Virginia of all places, surrounded by Jeffersons.”

“If you think of a better solution, feel free to share,” Thomas responded defensively, for obvious reasons not enjoying Hamilton’s immediate dislike of his family and home. A dislike so immediate that he disliked them before even seeing them, apparently.

“Whatever,” Hamilton dismissed his defensiveness without a second thought, “we still need to tell everyone as quickly as possible.”

“What’s our story, first of all?”

“We’ve been dating for- does a year seem too rushed? Well anyway, one night you were so overcome by your love for me you decided there was nothing for it but to propose,” Hamilton looked smugly satisfied with his idea.

“Why do I have to be the one overcome by love?” Thomas asked indignantly.

“I’m not buying a ring,” Hamilton stated simply.

Thomas sighed dramatically before telling him, “Luckily for us, I already have one.”

“You just randomly have an engagement ring lying around?” Hamilton asked incredulously.

“No, not ‘randomly’. My grandfather used it to propose to my grandmother, and my father used it to propose to my mother. It’s been passed down in the family, and I’m the oldest unmarried sibling, so it was passed on to me. You can wear it, so long as you don’t lose it,” Thomas offered.

“I won’t lose it,” Hamilton snapped, before seeming to think about what Thomas had said a bit more, “Don’t you think that’s kind of a sentimental item to be using in a fake marriage scheme?”

“Well, I don’t exactly love the idea, but it only makes sense if we need my family to believe us,” Thomas pointed out.

“I guess,” Hamilton agreed reluctantly, still not seeming entirely sold on the idea. Thomas could relate. 

“So we’ve been dating for about a year, we only got engaged recently, but we just can’t wait to get married, so we’ll be doing it very soon,” Thomas summarized.

“Sounds about right,” Hamilton agreed, though he sounded grumpy about it.

“Great,” Thomas said, hesitating a moment before pulling out his phone.

“What’re you doing?” Hamilton asked, seeming more than a little alarmed.

“Calling my mother,” Thomas answered shortly.

“Now?” Hamilton seemed nothing short of frantic at the thought.

“No time like the present,” Thomas said, and when no argument was immediately presented, he pulled up his mother’s contact and hit call.

It didn’t take her long to pick up. Thomas had thought Hamilton would make some sort of jab at the exchange of “hey, Mama,” and “hi, Tommy,” but surprisingly enough, he didn’t comment, just sitting tensely in his chair, waiting for something to happen. They went through all the normal small talk about his siblings who still lived at or near home and about how work was going, along with other basic topics that came up whenever they spoke.

Soon enough, Thomas interrupted the flow of the conversation with, “Actually, I called so I could tell you something.”

When asked what, he decided he might as well bite the bullet and come right out with it, letting as much excitement and happiness drip into his voice as he could before saying, “I’m getting married.”

Immediately, there was a commotion and an onslaught of questions coming at him. Something that he’d been expecting, especially considering as far as his family knew, he wasn’t dating anyone. To go from that to suddenly getting married must seem like a big leap from their point of view. The main question being asked was, of course, who it was he was marrying.

“Is it James? I know you said you were just friends, but he seems like such a shy boy, I could see him wanting to keep something like this quiet. Or is it, oh what’s his name.. The one you met in France?”

Once upon a time, his mother would have been hoping against hope it was a female he’d decided to marry, guessing all women, generally expecting him to conform to heteronormativity. This had honestly been what he’d expected of her growing up, since she’d had a rather stereotypical southern conservative mindset, though minus the racism, for obvious reasons. He was somewhat conservative himself, but not to the extent that she had been, and more in economic policy than anything. He wasn’t hypocritical enough to try and denounce the lgbtq+ community, for one thing. He might have called himself a Libertarian if not for the fact that he could have more influence as a Republican. Regardless of party nuances, she’d done a lot of improving of her mindset, and he was lucky enough that her love for him was enough to get her to open her eyes and start becoming more accepting.

“Neither of those, Mama, it’s someone else. His name is Alexander,” and boy did it feel strange calling Hamilton by his first name. Though he supposed he should start getting used to it.

Hamilton looked extremely uncomfortable as Thomas started explaining to her the timeline they had come up with and answering all the questions she had. Frankly, Thomas was uncomfortable too. He hated lying to his family, and especially his mother.

“Well, you’d better come down to stay for a while before the wedding. I want to meet this boy properly,” was her reaction when she heard how soon they planned on getting married.

“I’ll have to talk to Alex about it,” he replied.

“You’d better,” by her tone, Thomas knew there was no way they would be getting out of it. Hopefully they could get away with just staying for a few days before the wedding.

Soon enough the call had ended and Thomas put his phone down on the table, matching pained expressions on his and Hamilton’s faces.

“She can be counted on to spread the news to the rest of my family,” Thomas stated, “so now we just have to tell everyone we know in New York.”

“I don’t suppose we could just send a group text or something?” Hamilton asked half heartedly. Thomas just shook his head, knowing they’d never get away with that, and Hamilton slumped in his seat. 

“How about you text your friends that you have something to tell them and then you can make the announcement in person,” Thomas suggested.

“Me? I’m not doing it myself, you need to be there too,” Hamilton insisted. 

“What? Why?”

“They’ll think it’s weird if you’re not there!” Which was probably true but, at the moment, Thomas couldn't think of a single thing worse than getting together with all of Hamilton’s friends to announce their supposed romantic relationship.

“Fine. But I’m bringing James,” there was no way Thomas was putting himself in such an anxiety inducing situation without some backup.

“Fine. Tonight? My place?”

“Fine,” and in unspoken agreement, having mostly forgotten about the sandwiches sitting on the plates in front of them, they each picked up their phones to let their respective friends know the situation.

~~~

As it turned out, throwing his lunch away in an uncharacteristic fit of dramatics was not the best decision James had ever made. He discovered this fact about an hour after he usually took his lunch break, when his stomach growled halfway through a sentence he was typing.

He supposed he’d just have to go out somewhere and get lunch, but he could admit that the desire to go and eat alone in some random cafe was not a very strong one. Luckily for him, the one thing he knew of that could simultaneously distract from heartache and cure hunger was a good pastry. Even luckier for him, one of his best friends owned a bakery nearby.

Dolley’s Desserts was within walking distance of the office, a little retro style bakery that was pretty popular with the office worker crowd since it was in such close proximity to several office buildings. When James arrived, he walked straight up to the counter, sitting down to the left of the cash register where Dolley had a set up resembling a bar. It was a small stretch of counter lined with stools, enabling Dolley to more easily chat with customers, which was something she really enjoyed about her job. 

“What’s got you looking like a kicked puppy today?” Dolley asked, making sure there was no line waiting before coming over to lean on the counter across from James.

According to almost anyone who knew James, his expressions were nigh on unreadable. But to certain people who paid attention, like Dolley and Thomas, he knew it was painfully obvious when he was upset, happy, or anything in between. Though even Thomas could miss things fairly often, likely because he didn’t expect himself to be the cause of any pain for James, so it wasn’t easy for him to see it. Dolley, though, knew everything. They had been close friends since high school, had even tried dating before it became extremely clear that James was as gay as they came. But they had retained their close friendship, and Dolley was the only one who knew the full extent of his feelings towards Thomas.

“Thomas is getting married,” he blurted before he could stop himself. He knew he couldn’t tell her the whole reality of the situation, not without betraying Thomas’ trust. But this much, he could say. Technically it wasn't even lying, just leaving out a lot of the nuances of the situation. Though it certainly didn’t feel as simple as that.

“Oh, honey,” Dolley said, her whole face going soft with sympathy. James had to look away so as not to betray any more emotion on his face.

“Do you want to talk about it?” Dolley asked, quietly, so no other customers would overhear. James just shook his head. Aside from truly not wanting to talk about it, he wouldn’t be able to tell Dolley everything anyways, so he couldn’t truly explain how he was feeling to her.

Dolley just nodded in acceptance, grabbing a pastry from behind the counter and placing it on a napkin in front of him without being asked. James thanked her quietly, but soon enough another customer walked in the door, and despite giving him one last concerned look, she was forced to divert her attention to them, leaving James once again alone with his thoughts.

He’d been sitting at the counter for only a minute or two when he felt his phone vibrate. Pulling it out of his pocket, he gave the text a quick glance, a small frown appearing on his face as he read it over. Looks like he’s going to Hamilton’s tonight to watch their trainwreck of a fake romance unfold.

“Here we go,” he muttered aloud to himself, just shaking his head when Dolley gave him a questioning look. He stuffed his phone back into his pocket and faced forward again, beginning to pick at the pastry in front of him, leaving James to settle quietly into his misery.

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for reading!


	4. It makes a strange sort of sense

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to everyone who comments or leaves kudos, y'all keep me motivated.
> 
> Also I know James has been constantly miserable this whole time (maybe less so in this chapter, idk) but trust me, I do have plans for him that don't involve constant pining

Alex sat on the couch in his apartment, Madison perched awkwardly on the far end of the couch, Jefferson settled between them, reclining as if he’d never been more comfortable in his life. He’d wordlessly handed Alex the ring he’d mentioned earlier upon entering, and currently it was on his finger, though his hand was jammed uncomfortably into his pants pocket so it wouldn’t be visible. 

None of them were speaking and all of them were hesitant to break the silence, Alex assumed for similar reasons. Well, if there was one thing Alexander couldn’t abide by, it was awkward silence. Plus, he did actually have some news to share.

“So, Jefferson-” he started.

“Thomas,” Jefferson corrected nonchalantly, Alex glaring at him for daring to interrupt.

“So, Jefferson-” he started again, determined to ignore the interjection. Besides, there was no way he was going to allow the pseudo-intimacy using his first name would create.

“You can’t call me Jefferson in front of your friends. They’ll never believe we’re getting married if we’re not even on first name terms,” he pointed out. Damn him for being right.

“Fine. Thomas,” he spat the name like it was a curse, but it was enough for Jefferson to give him a nod of satisfaction, “I talked to Washington earlier.”

It had been utterly humiliating. He hadn’t even told him about the whole marriage thing yet, wanting to plant the idea that Jefferson might be deserving of promotion without Washington immediately dismissing it as nepotism. But he’d had to spew some bullshit about thinking Jefferson’s potential was wasted in his current position, and had to say that he didn’t see his political beliefs as making him any less valuable to the campaign. It had taken all the acting skills he possessed to make it seem like this was genuinely something he believed and was willing to advocate for. Washington had told him he’d displayed great maturity in coming to him about this, but that didn’t stop the whole ordeal from leaving a sour taste in Alex’s mouth.

“And?” Jefferson was still feigning indifference, but by the way he tensed up slightly at the mention of Washington, it was obvious that he was invested. 

“And I talked you up a bit, tried to plant the idea that you’re trustworthy,” Alex replied, a grimace on his face as he relayed this information.

“Talked me up, did you? What did you tell him? I admit you’ve got me curious,” the smugness was practically radiating off of Jefferson in waves. Which was utterly ridiculous considering this had just been a part of their deal and didn’t actually mean anything.

“Wouldn’t you like to know?” Alexander snapped back. In all likelihood, Jefferson just wanted to hear him complimenting him, and frankly, he had no intention of giving him the satisfaction.

“Actually, I would,” Thomas replied easily, a small smirk growing on his face.

“Fuck off,” Alexander said, for lack of a better response. And then, “Do you want to know what he said or not?”

“Sure,” Jefferson said lightly, still obviously trying to pretend he cared less than he did.

“Well, he’s not going to promote you just because I came up and asked. But he’s going to monitor your work more closely for a while before he makes a decision,” he explained.

Jefferson nodded, seeming to straighten up a bit upon getting at least a somewhat favorable response.

“Don’t crumble under the pressure,” Alex said mockingly. Though, in a sense, he really was rooting for him not to. Mostly because if he messed up too badly and actually did ruin his shot at a promotion, he might feel like Alex hadn’t properly held up his side of the bargain and be less motivated to continue helping him.

“Of course I won’t,” Jefferson huffed, acting like it was the most obvious thing in the world that he’d succeed.

Soon enough, Alexander found himself completely ignored as Jefferson and Madison started speaking to each other in low tones. Theoretically, he could have eavesdropped on what they were saying without an issue considering they were sitting right next to him. But all he could focus on was the fact that his friends were set to arrive at any moment and he was going to have to somehow convince them that he and Jefferson were getting married. And once he’d convinced them of that, he’d have to convince them he hadn’t entirely lost his mind, which was arguably more difficult.

~~~

Thomas’ heart was practically beating out of his chest with nerves. He knew Hamilton couldn’t tell, he had plenty of experience making sure Hamilton only ever saw him at his most confident, or at least when he appeared to be at his most confident. James was another story, constantly shooting him concerned glances, luckily subtle ones that Hamilton was unlikely to pay much attention to. Truthfully, as it stood, he was terrified to be present when Hamilton relayed the news to his friends. Aside from Lafayette and possibly Angelica, he wouldn’t be surprised to hear they all despised him. His default when he was nervous was to take on an overly confident, overly charming persona, but he sincerely doubted that would help at all in this scenario.

At least Washington had seemed willing to give him a chance. A chance was all Thomas really needed, he was confident he could succeed if only Washington would pay any attention to his contributions. And apparently, soon he’d be doing just that. 

But first, Thomas just needed to survive today. James was being helpful, making small talk and engaging him in meaningless conversation to help get his mind off the situation. And he was beyond grateful for it, but he was having difficulty focusing on the conversation with how much he was dreading people arriving.

It seemed like no time at all and yet also like a thousand years had passed when there was a knock at the apartment door.

“It’s open,” Hamilton called, evidently having no intention of actually getting up to open the door. The figure who made its way into the living room was definitely not any of the people who he’d been expecting.

“You invited Burr?” he asked, surprised.

“No, I didn’t invite Burr,” Hamilton insisted, seeming a mixture of shocked and furious, “Burr, what the fuck are you doing here?” Thomas turned to look at Burr more fully, thinking that was a rather good question.

“I invited him,” James cut in before Burr would need to defend himself, rising to his feet as he did so.

“Hello, everyone,” Burr said, slightly awkwardly, though apparently now feeling secure enough to greet them. There was a moment of tense silence before Hamilton, predictably, exploded.

“What the fuck? Madison, this is my home, you can’t just invite whoever the fuck you want!” Honestly, Thomas thought that he had a point, not that he’d ever betray James by saying so. He wasn’t inclined to trust Burr and he saw no need for him to be there.

“You and Thomas are going to be so wrapped up in each other, I wanted someone I could talk to,” James told Hamilton calmly.

James couldn’t spell it out since Burr wasn’t going to know about the fake aspect of their relationship, but Thomas immediately got what he meant by that. James obviously felt insecure about this situation as well, if he had to guess, most likely because of how outnumbered they’d be by Hamilton’s friends. He wanted another friend there, a friend who wouldn’t be too wrapped up in a charade the whole night to pay much attention to James. Thomas was a bit surprised he hadn’t brought Dolley instead, she’d be a much less controversial presence, at least when it came to Hamilton. But James and Burr were friends, so Thomas supposed he really shouldn’t be too surprised.

Burr looked slightly lost at that statement, probably a bit lost in general as to what was going on. Hamilton, for his part, was still fuming, probably laying out in his head exactly how he was going to lay into James.

“You might as well sit down, Aaron,” Thomas piped up before Hamilton could say anything. Burr nodded and did as he was told, moving to sit on a nearby loveseat. Without hesitating, James followed and seated himself next to him.

“Ugh. Fine,” Hamilton huffed. Clearly, he still wanted to argue, but it was three against one at this point and he was probably seeing that his chances weren’t great. 

Now they were just waiting for everyone else to arrive. The nervous tension in the room was heavy, but Burr determinedly ignored it, doing his best to engage him and James in some pleasant small talk while they passed the time. Hamilton was resolutely ignoring them, so Thomas supposed Burr had just preemptively given up on trying to include him.

Soon enough, more and more people arrived in the apartment, filling up the furniture in the living room before resorting to dragging in chairs from the kitchen or just sitting on the ground. There were various reactions from the people who arrived, but most people just seemed confused, aside from the immediate suspicion and hostility that came from Laurens. In response to all the questioning, Hamilton had just been telling people they’d find out what was going on when everyone was here.

Though Thomas was pretty sure everyone was here at this point. Burr and James were, of course, still on the loveseat speaking quietly to each other, Laf had taken James’ previous spot on the couch, next to Thomas and Hamilton, Laurens was perched on the edge of an armchair looking like he was gearing up for a fight, Eliza and Angelica had both carried in chairs from the kitchen, while Peggy and Mulligan had both just sat on the ground, Mulligan leaned up against the couch in front of Laf. 

And yet Hamilton was still stalling.

~~~

  
  


“Start talking, Alex,” John said sharply. Alex was obviously apprehensive, didn’t want to say whatever he had summoned them here so dramatically to say. Frankly, John wasn’t having it. 

John didn’t trust this situation in the slightest. The thought that Jefferson, Madison, and Burr might be here for any sort of friendly or positive reason had never once crossed his mind. Nothing good ever came out of the three of them being together as far as John was concerned. Blackmail of some sort had honestly been his first thought when he’d walked in to see the four of them sitting together somewhat peaceably, Jefferson right next to Alex. His suspicions had only been heightened when Alex had refused to tell him what was going on right away. 

John didn’t work with the two of them, having pursued a career in the medical field instead. But that didn’t mean he didn’t know Jefferson and Madison well enough to know they were bad news- they had all gone to college together after all. Hating them was something he and Alex had agreed on since the very beginning, there was no way that could have changed. 

“Jeff- ow!” Jefferson had not at all subtly elbowed Alex not one syllable into his sentence and John’s eyes automatically narrowed.

“Sorry, force of habit,” Alex smiled a clearly forced smile bluntly stating, “Thomas and I are engaged.”

You could have heard a pin drop in the ensuing shocked silence, assuming the pin was even able to fall through the air, considering how thick it was with tension.

“No you’re not,” John stated it as a fact once he had collected himself. Though nobody was paying any particular attention to John as the room soon erupted into noisy chaos, everyone expressing their disbelief in various ways.

Soon enough, Angelica’s voice cut through the noise, with a simple order, “Explain.” It grew relatively quiet, as everyone waited to hear how there could possibly be a reasonable explanation for this.

“Well, we’ve been dating for a while and-”

“Bullshit, you were telling me just last week that you thought the reason for his stupidity was that the logic couldn’t penetrate all that hair product to reach his brain,” John interrupted. There was absolutely no way this could be happening. He could think of no logical reason for the two of them to be engaged.

“I said it with love?” Alex tried, though John didn’t believe it for a second, watching as Jefferson gave him an indignant look.

“Was it also with love when you told me the country was doomed if he were ever to weasel his way into a position of power?” Peggy piped up, and John gestured towards her emphatically, Peggy’s words further proving his point.

Soon enough, the others were adding their own anecdotes of times Alex had insulted Jefferson. It wasn’t like there was a shortage of times he’d done so, and the more stories added, the more squirmy Alex got, clearly trying to find some way to talk himself out of this situation and failing.

“Alex was already nervous to tell you all about this, if we could stop throwing around accusations, I’m sure this would go a lot smoother for everyone,” Jefferson cut in, voice hard. Without looking, he grabbed Alex’s hand and twined their fingers together, inadvertently putting the ring on full display. Alex tensed for a second at the contact, but relaxed almost immediately afterwards. If they were acting, they must be damn good actors.

Everyone’s eyes were almost magnetically drawn to the ring, it serving almost as further proof that there was at least some validity to the bullshit being spewed at them. Though nobody mentioned it just yet, since the main priority was still figuring out what the fuck was going on. 

“Sorry,” Angelica spoke up again, surprised, like the rest of them, that Jefferson had stuck up for Alex and actually seemed genuine about it, “but you have to admit this doesn’t make much sense.”

“This is pretty sudden,” Hercules added and Angelica nodded in confirmation.

Alex nodded in acceptance, “We were going to tell you at some point. We talked about it when we were dating, but…” 

“It’s my fault we didn’t really. I know most of you don’t like me, I was afraid of what you’d think,” Jefferson took over smoothly when Alex was clearly uncomfortable. He gently rubbed Alex’s hand with his thumb, hands still intertwined. And, amazingly, a slight flush appeared on Alexander’s cheeks. John raised an eyebrow, though, unimpressed with Jefferson’s answer.

“You could've told me, Thomas. I would have been happy for you,” Laf told him, seeming upset, thinking his friend hadn’t thought to trust him. Thomas looked down, obviously uncomfortable.

“I’m sorry..” he said to Laf, who seemed to be having difficulty shrugging off the hurt. There was a heavy silence and John didn’t know what to do to break the moment, or if he even should. Luckily, he was saved when Laf spoke up again.

“Well!” Laf clapped his hands together, visibly putting effort into pushing away the hurt, “if my two good friends are to be married, then I must know everything!”

Soon enough, Alex and Jefferson were feeding off each other, weaving a frankly implausible sounding story, at least in John’s opinion. But everyone else was apparently eating it up, listening intently, asking tons of questions as a picture started to come together.

Frankly, John still wasn’t buying a single second of this. He was pretty sure nobody else was either, that they were just getting the two of them to talk, waiting for them to slip up somehow so they could drill them even harder about why in the hell they were doing this. He didn’t buy at all that there was even a chance Alex had been secretly dating Jefferson of all people for over a year. Just the way they talked about each other with such venom was all the evidence John needed.

Though he doubted calling them out directly would result in anything but more defensiveness. He supposed he’d just have to wait and see what happened. In the meantime, all he could do was go along with it for the time being.

“This doesn’t mean I have to start calling him ‘Thomas’, does it?” he asked, half joking half not. There were a few bouts of laughter and he was reassured that no he did not have to call him Thomas. Thank God.

As time passed, everyone seemed to relax, at least marginally, falling into something resembling normal conversation rather than the questioning they’d been subjecting Alex and Jefferson to previously.

They hadn’t slipped up yet. But John would be watching and waiting. He was going to get to the bottom of this if it was the last thing he did. He couldn’t leave this situation alone if there was a chance that Alex was being exploited in some way.

~~~

Eventually, the gathering had obtained a much more relaxed atmosphere. As everyone calmed down and slowly began to process the idea of Alex and Thomas actually being together, there was less questioning and more genuinely getting to know Thomas, and to an extent, James and Aaron as well. And as the night wore on and everyone got drowsier, Alex and Thomas seemed to be less on the defensive, relaxing enough to seem genuinely affectionate towards each other. At one point, later in the night, Alex had actually laid his head on Thomas’ shoulder, seemingly about to fall asleep. Thomas had put his arm around Alex in response, holding him close.

That had been around when Eliza and her sisters had decided it was time to leave. She had things to do the next day and so did they, and it was getting late. Angelica had driven her and Peggy here, so now the three of them were piled into her car, Peggy in the front seat messing with the radio, Eliza in the back. 

“I can’t be the only one who still thinks this is really weird,” Peggy commented once they had pulled away from the house.

“No, this is definitely weird,” Angelica agreed. 

“It was unexpected, but.. It makes a strange sort of sense,” Eliza said. Peggy practically whipped around in her seat to give her an incredulous look, and even Angelica raised her eyebrows at her, glancing at her in the mirror.

Maybe it was because she wasn’t as skeptical as Peggy, having a more trusting and compassionate attitude which ultimately led her into her career as a social worker, or maybe it was that she didn’t have experience with them to the same extent as Angelica, who worked in the same office as them, but she wanted to give the two of them a chance before jumping into any conclusions.

“Just think about it. They’re very similar people, aside from some differences in ideology. So when the animosity fades, what does that leave?” Eliza couldn’t put into words exactly how she felt about it, but she was still willing to defend her position.

“I don’t buy it,” Peggy disagreed bluntly, turning back around in her seat.

“At least they looked happy together,” Angelica said diplomatically. At least that was something they could all agree on.

~~~

Soon enough, it had gotten late and everyone had begun leaving Alex’s apartment. Presently, the only people still here were himself, Jefferson, Madison and Burr. He was still leaning into Jefferson, under his arm, head resting snugly on his shoulder. It was simultaneously extremely awkward and extremely comfortable. In a very strange and uncharacteristic way, he was almost grateful Burr was still there and didn’t know anything, so Alex had the excuse to stay in this position. Not that this meant he didn’t hate Jefferson or anything like that. He was just comfortable.

Soon enough, though, Burr was saying his goodbyes and making for the door, along with Madison, who had chosen to get a ride home with him.

The minute they were alone, Jefferson practically snatched his arm away from Alex. Taking the hint, Alex sat up and scooted sideways so there was at least a foot of space between them.

“Do you think they bought it?” he asked. 

“They better have bought it, we just cuddled for over an hour,” the way Jefferson spat the words made it seem like he’d been totally repulsed and disgusted by what they’d been doing. 

Alex didn’t care about Jefferson’s opinions in the slightest, but he felt an inexplicable pang of hurt at the statement nonetheless. Which of course was ridiculous. Just because they’d entered into this scheme together didn’t mean they suddenly were friends, or even that they weren’t enemies for that matter. They were enemies with a common cause, if anything.

He forced himself to snort in response, feigning a mixture of annoyance and amusement, “Unfortunately, we’re probably going to have to get used to that kind of thing.”

“Unfortunately,” Jefferson echoed, his tone somewhat harsh.

Jefferson didn’t stick around much longer after that. He had no reason to.

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for reading!


	5. So you and Jefferson are getting married

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for all the kudos and comments! Y'all really motivate me, I'm so glad people are reading this.
> 
> I'm sorry it's taken me a bit longer than usual to update, I've had a lot going on lately, but we should be back to our regularly scheduling programming now.

Alex sat across from Jefferson at his kitchen table in his godforsaken penthouse, which Alexander still thought was completely unnecessary and ostentatious. He was glaring at him over the top of his coffee mug, overall trying not to think too much about his situation.

When he’d first begin this whole scheme with Jefferson, he’d willfully ignored all the less pleasant aspects of it, because he’d known that the end result would be both his career and his citizenship being saved. But now that they were actually getting into this, the downsides were becoming all too clear.

The most major downside being that their engagement, and especially their marriage, wouldn’t be at all believable if they didn’t actually actively live at the same address. Alex was perfectly content living in his own perfectly reasonable apartment and he’d had no desire to leave. He didn’t exactly want Jefferson to live with him, but it was preferable to having to leave what he considered to be his home. Jefferson disagreed. In his opinion, since Alex was the one to have dragged him into this, he should be the one to have to move. After days of arguing, both of them threatening to pull out of the agreement on several occasions, Alex had been forced to give in simply for the sake of moving the plan along believably. Though he wasn’t okay with it all of a sudden just because he’d given in. He still very much held it against Jefferson.

He had brought a few bags of what he considered essential items, hastily stashing them in Jefferson’s guest room. He figured since soon enough they’d have to leave for Virginia anyways. He might as well just grab the bulk of his stuff once they got back. It was a Saturday, so theoretically Alex could be using this time to settle in. More than likely, though, by the time afternoon comes around he’ll have gotten bored enough to pull out his laptop and do some work from home.

Currently, Jefferson was sipping from his own coffee mug across from Alex, seemingly oblivious to the anger broiling in Alex. He didn’t look as smug as he normally did, which certainly helped, but at the same time, he was just staring at his phone and sipping his coffee, completely ignoring Alex as if it didn’t even matter that his whole life had practically been uprooted. Alex was getting irritated by it almost to irrational levels.

“What are you doing?” he snapped, once he couldn’t stand the silence any longer.

Jefferson raised an eyebrow at the small outburst, but turned his phone around so that Alex could see it was open to the notes app, “Planning.”

“Planning what?” Alex asked, annoyed by the vague answer and leaning forward to try and make out the small words on the screen.

“Our wedding,” Jefferson replied, smiling sardonically as he turned his phone screen away before Alex really had a chance to see anything.

“What? You can’t just start planning that without me!” Alex once again jumped straight into anger.

“Relax, I’m just making a list of things we need to organize,” Jefferson said, finally starting to sound a little annoyed by Alex’s confrontational attitude.

“Oh,” Alex deflated a little, “send it to me.”

“I was going to. I’m also dividing it in half, so we can each be responsible for an equal amount of it. We should get to work on it as soon as possible,” Jefferson was again looking at his phone instead of Alex.

“Obviously. What about the budget?” This was the most important aspect of the planning as far as Alex was concerned. Unlike Jefferson, he wasn’t made of money, he didn’t want to throw the majority of his savings into this.

“What about the budget?” Jefferson repeated, sounding like he thought it was a stupid question. 

“Yes. I’m not throwing a bunch of money into a marriage I don’t even want,” Alex replied hotly.

“Well, bad news, marriages cost a bunch of money,” Jefferson said distractedly, still not looking up. Then, sensing that Alex was probably about to go off on him, he sighed and added, “Don’t worry about the budget. I’ll cover it.”

Alex immediately shot him a glare, “I don’t need your handouts.”

“It’s not a handout,” Jefferson snapped back, “Neither of us want this marriage. I have money to waste on it. You don't. It's just practical.”

Alex could see the sense in that, but at the same time it was definitely a blow to his pride to just accept that his wedding would be paid for by Jefferson. Even if the fact that the marriage was to Jefferson himself sort of made that concern null and void.

Once again apparently sensing the incoming verbal attack from Alex, Jefferson abruptly switched to a whole new line of conversation, “I think we should get married on the Fourth of July. It’s before election season picks up too heavily. Plus, we both work in politics, so it makes sense, and we can just look at someone else’s fireworks rather than putting time and money into some excessive celebration of our own.”

Alex thought about that for a second, running the timeline in his head. It was early June now so they’d really have to jump to organizing this wedding, but he did think it would be manageable at the least. “Sure,” he nodded, agreeing easily for once. 

“Great. Remember we’ll have to leave for Virginia at least a week earlier so we can visit with my parents, so make sure you ask for time off work soon,” Jefferson said, in a warning tone.

“Obviously,” Alex said, annoyed even though Jefferson was probably right to be skeptical of him. It was generally pretty difficult to drag him away from his work for any extended period of time. 

Jefferson didn’t bother to respond, going straight back to typing on his phone. Alex decided it wasn’t worth saying anything else, so he simply sat back and continued sipping his coffee. Soon enough, his phone buzzed in his pocket. When he pulled it out, it was to see a text from Jefferson. His half of the list of things to organize before the wedding. An apprehensive feeling settled in his gut as he took in the sheer length of it, starting to slightly regret agreeing to setting the marriage only one month in the future. Though he’d always been able to pull through with doing huge amounts of work on strict deadlines, so he was hopeful he could manage it. Though he worried at how Jefferson would handle it considering he didn’t have the same workaholic tendencies as Alex.

~~~

The next few weeks are a blur of activity for Thomas. He spends a lot of time making phone calls and arrangements, getting his half of the details sorted out for the wedding. He can only hope that Hamilton is showing it half the dedication he is, since whenever he brings it up with the man, he’s only met with irritation.

On top of the time and effort that’s going into wedding planning, Thomas is conscious of workload with the campaign team increasing as well as gaining some substance. He begins to feel like the decisions he’s making actually matter. At the same time, he’s aware that his being trusted like this is a test and it’s extremely conditional. If he slips up even once, Washington might decide that Hamilton was wrong to endorse him, take away his responsibility, and let Thomas’ professional association with him end the moment he’s inaugurated. And Thomas wants that cabinet position more than perhaps anything he’s wanted in his life. He’s determined not to slip up, and so far, he hasn’t. 

Additionally, the issue of Hamilton moving in with him surprisingly hadn’t become as much of a problem as he expected. Maybe it was just that the both of them were extremely busy. Thomas had a newly heavy workload, Hamilton’s workload had always been heavy, and the both of them had wedding planning to deal with. For the most part, they didn’t see much of each other, occasionally crossing paths in common areas of the living space, but for the most part getting their piles and piles of work done in their respective rooms. 

An expected though unfortunate side effect of all this working is that he’d hardly had the chance to talk to James. He’d had to cancel almost all of their lunches, and he felt horrible about it, but the simple fact was every moment mattered. All of his focus and drive was pointed towards these two objectives- his career and his wedding. His mind hardly had room for anything else.

The workaholic lifestyle didn’t suit him the way it seemed to suit Hamilton. He felt constantly drained. He looked like a completely different person when he saw himself in the mirror, bags under his eyes that no amount of skincare products could erase, a slump in his posture, hair that lay flatter and duller against his head. The only thing keeping him going was the thought of retiring to Virginia in the week before his wedding. He resolved that despite the fact that he’d have to be faking a relationship while there, he was going to relax. And when they returned, he was going to find something of a work life balance. And above all, he was going to make all this up to James. He didn’t know quite how yet, but he did know that he’d leaned on him for support almost constantly when all this began and then seemingly drifted straight out of his life without a thought as soon as his workload became too much. He was going to have to fix it somehow.

~~~

James had been trying not to let the distinct absence of Thomas from his life get to him. In the back of his mind, he’d known this was coming. He’d known this would result in a heavier workload for Thomas, had known he’d need to be spending a lot of his time with Hamilton. But this knowledge hadn’t prepared him for the reality of it.

In theory, his life hadn’t changed too much. They were both busy men even before all of this had unfolded with Hamilton, and it wasn’t always easiest to make the time to see each other. But they were best friends and so they had always made it a priority to make at least some time for each other. Evidently though, James wasn’t a priority of Thomas’ any longer, and James was- well, he was dealing.

Now, James sat at a table in the corner of the breakroom, low quality styrofoam cup of coffee cradled in his hands as he attempted to take somewhat of a break. He had a lot of work to get done, but none of the deadlines were too pressing, so he could afford to take a few minutes to try and get out of his thoughts by leaving the lonely confines of his office.

Then, completely counter to his plans to take a few minutes to relax, Thomas and Hamilton came waltzing into the breakroom. Well, waltzing perhaps wasn’t the right word, the pair of them were hardly conscious of their surroundings as they jabbered on about something they were both looking at on Thomas’ phone. Probably something wedding related. Regardless, they made straight for the coffee machine, Thomas graciously standing aside to let Hamilton make his cup first, neither of them so much as glancing around. They hadn’t noticed him, but James sure had noticed them.

Before too much time could pass, someone sat down at the table across from James, interrupting his focus. James quickly whipped his gaze away from the pair, hoping against hope that his staring hadn’t been noticeable. Though, seeing that the person who’d sat down was Aaron, and seeing the sympathetic expression on his face, he knew that hope was futile. 

“Which one?” Aaron asked quietly, a small smile on his face, obviously having noted the expression of pining on James’ face. Normally, James would hate being called out this directly and outright refuse to answer. James hadn’t told anyone but Dolley about his feelings for Thomas and he hadn’t intended to change that anytime soon. But Aaron didn’t seem demanding, he just seemed patient and sympathetic, like if James were to completely change the subject or refuse to answer, Aaron would take it in his stride rather than push him. Maybe that was what convinced James to let this conversation continue.

James let out a small sigh before simply replying, “Thomas.”

“I figured,” Aaron replied, just nodding.

“How did you know?” James asked, growing curious. Sure, he’d been looking at Thomas and Hamilton just then, but he didn’t think it had been enough to give him away.

“Well, I’d like to think we’ve been getting closer in the last month,” Aaron began. James nodded. They had. Aaron had always been a friend, but James had come to rely on him and Dolley a hundred times more with Thomas seemingly ignoring him and grown even closer to the both of them as a result.

“And I’ve been in your shoes before,” Aaron continued, giving a small smile when he saw the skeptical look on James’ face, “Not with Thomas. It was way back at university, when Laurens and Hamilton were still together.”

With just those words, all the pieces seemed to snap together in James’ head. He hadn’t gone to the same college as Aaron or Hamilton, but the fallout of their friendship was dramatic enough that James could still see signs of it in the cool and polite way Aaron treated Hamilton and in the outright hostility Hamilton directed at Aaron. He’d heard references to their past friendship before, but he didn’t know exactly what had gone wrong and had always supposed it wasn’t his business to ask. He supposed this might have something to do with it, that Aaron’s past might have mirrored James’ present, with him pining after the painfully unavailable Hamilton. This made a lot of sense, but simultaneously didn’t feel like the whole story. Though he decided not to question too far into it unless Aaron offered the information, never having felt right about prying information out of people.

“I’m sorry,” James said simply, not wanting to drag up any old memories for Aaron.

“It’s alright. It’s been a long time since then. People change. I’ve moved on,” Aaron was still looking at him, but his sympathetic expression had morphed into something else that James couldn’t quite read.

James didn’t have an opportunity to respond, as Thomas and Hamilton had apparently finished getting their coffee and were heading for the door. Thomas had finally spotted James, and he paused in the doorway to grin at him and Aaron, waving at them both before leaving. He looked more exhausted than James had ever seen him, but the smile looked genuine. He seemed happy. Hamilton had paused when Thomas did, following his gaze. He gave them an awkward wave, apparently following Thomas’ lead in deciding to be friendly. But he didn’t linger or even smile, quickly breezing out of the room after Thomas.

James had barely had the time to wave back before they were gone. He sighed, and when he turned back around, it was to find Aaron already looking at him, a small smile on his lips. Almost against his will, James smiled back, relaxing minutely.

“You’ll move on too, with enough time. This isn’t forever,” Aaron said, picking up where he left off as if he’d never been interrupted.

“Like you moved on, with Theodosia?” James couldn’t help but ask. He was surprised when Aaron snorted in response.

“Theodosia is my friend, and I adore her, but we’re not together. She merely needed some help getting out of her current marriage. I offered to help her with her divorce case, as her husband is not exactly being cooperative,” Aaron explained, apparently amused that James had been buying into the rumors.

“Is she alright?” James asked, surprised and having had no idea.

“She is. She’s staying with a friend at the moment.”

“And she doesn’t mind you telling me this?” James was a bit concerned about whether or not Theodosia would want him knowing this.

“She prefers it to you thinking we’re together,” Aaron said, expression going unreadable.

“Me specifically? You’ve discussed me with her?” James asked confused. Aaron didn’t respond, his expression going even more guarded if possible.

“Oh,” James said eventually as the realization set in, “so when you said you moved on, you were referring to…”

“Yes,” Aaron cut in before James could finish the sentence.

“And when you said I would move on eventually too, were you hoping that I would..”

“Turn to me? No. In this I genuinely am trying to support you. As a friend, I want you to be happy, and if your feelings for Thomas are making you unhappy, then I don’t want you to have them,” Aaron replied, almost defensively.

“But you think of me as… more than a friend?” James asked, still feeling the need to clarify.

Aaron took a deep breath before replying, “yes.”

“Aaron… you know I can’t-”

“I know,” Aaron cut him off once again, “and I understand.”

“I’m sorry,” James told him, not knowing how else to reply, and feeling more horrible than he had before.

“Don’t be sorry. I should never have told you this. You have enough to deal with without me piling on more,” Aaron said, obviously regretting that this had clearly only served to make James feel worse.

“No. It’s good that you told me. Your emotions matter just as much as mine do,” James said, firmly meeting his eyes. Though Aaron didn’t seem entirely convinced.

“This won’t change anything between us, will it?” Aaron asked nervously.

“Of course it won’t. It would be pretty hypocritical of me if it did,” James replied, smiling weakly. 

“Okay,” Aaron acknowledged, relaxing slightly, though he still seemed uncomfortable. James wished he knew some way he could help.

“Okay,” he said in return, relieved when Aaron eventually returned his smile.

~~~

Alex paced nervously back and forth in front of Washington’s office, trying to work up the courage to knock. There were only a few days left until he and Jefferson needed to leave for Virginia, and he still hadn’t worked up the courage to even let Washington know the wedding was happening. Jefferson had wanted to tell him sooner and had been bugging Alex about it almost constantly, mostly because he didn’t want it to reflect poorly on him that he was taking a two week long vacation with hardly any notice. But Alex knew that Washington would forgive them, or at least he’d forgive Alex and therefore not have an adequate excuse to fire Jefferson. He was frankly surprised that Jefferson had let his protests go on this long without simply marching up to tell Washington himself. But surprisingly enough, he seemed to respect his and Washington’s relationship enough to realize Alex would want to tell him something like this himself. 

He knew he had to tell him, he just didn’t know how he was supposed to walk up to someone he looked up to and respected and tell him such an absurd lie, and also have to make it believable. It didn’t feel possible, hence why he was still pacing up and down the hallway instead of already being in Washington’s office.

Without warning, Washington’s door opened and Alexander looked over to make eye contact with an amused looking Washington, “I was going to wait for you to come in on your own, but with how long you were pacing, I wasn’t sure it was going to happen at all.”

Alex flushed slightly, realizing Washington must have heard him pacing and fumbling for some sort of excuse and coming up empty.

“Why don’t you come on in?” Washington asked, gesturing into his office and taking a step back. Alex just wanted to run away from the paternal and friendly attitude Washington was displaying, knowing he was absolutely going to ruin the mood with what he had to tell him.

Alex just nodded and followed him into the office, instinctively sitting in the extra chair while Washington sat in his usual chair behind his desk. His mind was racing with how he could present this information and he still hadn’t said a word.

“What’s on your mind, son?” Washington asked him, seeming more concerned than before as Alex had still not spoken a word. 

“I need to request two weeks off starting next week,” he said, figuring he’d start with the tamer part. It hadn’t even crossed his mind to object to being called son, too focused on the bigger issue.

“Not that I’m going to refuse you, but this is very out of character for you,” Washington said. He clearly wanted to ask the reason.

“I’m sorry, sir, I know it’s short notice,” Alex apologized. He didn’t know if he could get the next words out of his mouth, so he opted instead just to pull an invitation out of his pocket and hand it across the desk to Washington.

The invitations were too fancy and flashy for Alex’s taste, practically screaming of money in his opinion. But the invitations had been Jefferson’s responsibility, so Alex hadn’t had a huge amount of say in them. They’d been giving them to everyone they wanted to invite by hand so they wouldn’t have to wait for them to arrive in the mail. Alex had already given them out to all his friends, so Washington was really the only person he still had to check off his list.

The silence was heavy and uncomfortable as he waited for Washington to finish reading, his eyebrows raising higher and higher the more he read.

“So you and Jefferson are getting married,” Washington said, placing the invitation down firmly on his desk. He seemed to be suppressing some sort of negative emotion, but Alex couldn’t read him well enough to tell exactly which.

“Yes, sir,” Alex said nervously, anticipating more of a reaction.

“This seems a little sudden,” Washington pointed out. Alex only nodded, he couldn’t very well deny that it was sudden.

“Are you sure this is a good idea?” Washington asked, finally expressing some emotion as he ran a hand down his face in frustration. 

“We’ve been in a relationship for a while now, I’d say we know each other well enough to get married,” Alex tried to explain.

“And you don’t think there’s a chance he could be using you?” Washington asked pointedly. 

“What do you mean?” Alex’s eyebrows shot up, not knowing what he was referring to. Technically, they were both using each other, but that shouldn’t be apparent to Washington.

“Do you recall giving me an endorsement of Jefferson about a month ago, telling me I could trust him with more? He very well could be using your affections for a career boost,” Washington told him, seemingly getting quite agitated at the thought.

“You think I could be manipulated into falling for something like that?” Alex asked, genuinely offended.

“I don’t know what to think. I just don’t want you to get hurt. Maybe you could put this off a bit longer, give it some more thought,” he suggested placatingly.

Alex sprang to his feet, getting defensive, “I know exactly what I’m getting into. The time and place are on the invitation, either come or don’t.”

He didn’t give Washington a chance to respond, heading straight for the office door and storming out. He knew his anger was irrational and Washington really was just looking out for him, but that didn’t stop him from being upset Washington would think so little of him, and that Washington would think so little of Jefferson for that matter. Not that he liked Jefferson by any means, but at least he didn’t think him so cruel as to have the potential as to play with someone’s feelings up until the point of marriage, all just to benefit his career. Jefferson could be ruthless, Alex knew, but not that ruthless.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for reading!


	6. So you're the mysterious fiancé

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I won't lie I really don't like this chapter, the characterization, the flow, none of it. But nothing I do seems to help, so you get what you get and you don't get upset I guess.
> 
> Thank you to everyone who's commented or left kudos, y'all make my day every time.

Thomas drummed his fingers on the steering wheel in annoyance, trying to tune out Hamilton as they drove down the highway. He’d complained once about being tired and now Hamilton wouldn’t stop giving him shit about it and half sarcastically offering to take over driving.

“Well, if you’re so tired, maybe I should just take over, huh? Avoid the safety hazard,” Hamilton said, leaning back casually against the seat. Though his statement was rather hypocritical considering the exhaustion audible in his voice.

“I’m sure it would be much more of a safety hazard to put you behind the wheel,” Thomas replied, keeping his eyes forward.

“What, don’t you trust me?” he asked, and Thomas could practically hear the smirk in his tone.

“Of course I don’t,” Thomas said without a moment’s hesitation. He wouldn’t trust him with his car in a normal situation, let alone for a six hour drive. It was seven in the morning and they were only an hour into the drive, and having been there to witness it, he knew for a fact that Hamilton had hardly got any sleep and then chugged an inhuman amount of coffee in the morning as if that would make up for it. Thomas was just waiting for the inevitable moment where Hamilton’s energy would peak and then simply crash.

“Why not?” Hamilton asked, feigning offense, “What’s the worst that could happen? I crash your shitty car?”

Thomas didn’t dignify that with a response, merely raising an eyebrow at him. For one, Thomas might not know much about cars, but he did know that given the price he’d paid, there was no way this car was shitty. And for two, Hamilton crashing the car would indeed be very bad.

“C’mon, Jefferson, I’m bored,” Thomas fought back an eye roll at that. Hamilton must really be tired if he was whining at him like that.

“You want me to let you drive my car because you’re bored?” he asked disbelievingly.

“Yes,” Hamilton confirmed shamelessly.

“No. It’s not my fault you didn’t bring anything to keep you busy,” as far as Thomas was aware, he hadn’t signed up for babysitting duty.

“I would’ve, but Washington wouldn’t let me bring any work along,” he said, clearly frustrated by that, as if he couldn’t understand the concept of taking a break from work, even for his own wedding.

“You could’ve brought something else,” Thomas pointed out. A book or something would’ve served the purpose just as well.

Hamilton heaved a sigh, but didn’t offer an immediate response. Most likely, he’d just forgotten to bring something, or hadn’t processed just how long six hours actually was. Hamilton opened his mouth, and suddenly feeling simultaneously very unmotivated to listen to whatever rant he was about to go on and very motivated to piss Hamilton off, he cut him off by suddenly reaching over to turn the radio on. 

“Here’s some entertainment for you,” he quickly navigated to some top 40 pop station, thinking it was most likely to annoy Hamilton. When it seemed like he was about to just talk over it, he turned the volume far up, far enough up that he couldn’t hear whatever Hamilton was saying. He met the glare being directed at him with a smirk, batting away Hamilton’s hand when he reached over to attempt to turn it off so he could talk.

After a few minutes best described as a clash of wills, Hamilton eventually slumped back against his seat in defeat, apparently resigned to hearing the blasting music. Thomas didn’t bother trying to hide his smug satisfaction at this result.

After a long few minutes turned into a long half hour devoid of any conversation or interaction, Thomas was frankly surprised Hamilton had let the radio keep playing for such a long time without saying anything more. He glanced to the side to see what was up, met with the sight of Hamilton slouched to the side, seemingly asleep. There was no way it could have been easy to fall asleep when it was so loud in the car, so this must have been the caffeine crash Thomas had been anticipating.

Smug demeanor fading now that Hamilton wasn’t actually awake to witness it, Thomas turned the volume way down so he wouldn’t disturb Hamilton’s sleep. Lord knows the man definitely needed it. That done, he turned his eyes back to the road and continued on with his driving in peace.

~~~

Alex hadn’t expected himself to be nervous at the prospect of meeting Jefferson’s family. It didn’t really matter what they thought of him. He had no actual romantic entanglement with Jefferson and they’d get divorced as soon as it made practical sense for them to do so. So if they didn’t like him, it shouldn’t affect him, not really. Nonetheless, the closer they got to Shadwell, the more he kept going over and over in his head everything that could potentially go wrong. 

The rest of the car ride, after Alex woke up from his impromptu nap, had been surprisingly tolerable. They were able to pass the time somewhat pleasantly, Jefferson filling him in on what he could expect from various family members, not even protesting when Alexander eventually reached over and switched the radio to a different station. 

Though the main thing Alex was getting from this conversation was that Jefferson had altogether too many siblings, too many to keep track of. Luckily, according to Jefferson, only two of them, Emma and Randolph, the twins, still lived at home, just having graduated highschool, so he wouldn’t be meeting most of them until later in the week. But he still didn’t feel at all prepared to be plunged headfirst into Jefferson’s family life and to have to act like he belonged there. They were only a few short minutes from Shadwell at this point and Alex could feel himself growing more and more tense with nerves.

Jefferson, on the other hand, seemed to be relaxing more and more the deeper into Virginia they drove. His mood had significantly brightened and it was more difficult to get him irritated. He’d clearly missed it here.

“Got the ring?” Jefferson asked almost absentmindedly, just making sure.

“No, I just decided to leave the engagement ring at home and spend the week before my wedding without it,” Alex said bitingly, voice coming out a bit more harsh than he’d meant it because of the stress.

Luckily, Jefferson didn’t take it badly, just snorting in response. He must really be in a good mood. 

In reality, it made perfect sense for Jefferson to want to make sure he had the ring, and probably would have made even more sense to make sure even sooner. Alex didn’t wear the ring to work under the guise of keeping their relationship under the radar and of course he didn’t wear it at Jefferson’s house. The only occasion to wear it was around his friends, and he hadn’t seen them very often because of the intensity of his workload over the past month. He hadn’t been wearing it practically at all, so for all Jefferson knew, he could have lost it. Currently, it was tucked into the front pocket of the bag he’d brought with him. 

“Better get it out, we’re almost there,” Jefferson said, turning into what seemed at first like a driveway, but continued on much longer than Alex thought driveways were supposed to. Looking out the window, Alex eventually realized what he was seeing was the grounds of Shadwell. It just seemed to be acres upon acres of farmland, with crops he couldn’t identify if he tried, having lived in a city for most of his life. 

He was just about to make a farm boy joke to Jefferson when the house came into view, if one could even call it that. It seemed closer to a manor or a mansion than anything else. Either way, Alex dove for his bag and pulled out the ring, sticking it on his finger before they could get too close. 

Soon enough, Jefferson had parked near the front of the house. He didn’t waste a second before climbing out, stretching his arms and taking a good look around, all with a small smile on his face. Alex just stayed there staring at him for a second. He was used to seeing Jefferson more relaxed now that they lived together, was used to the easy smug confidence he seemed to radiate. But him standing there in the Virginia sunlight felt surreal in a whole different way. He wasn’t sure he’d ever seen him this truly at ease before.

Of course the moment didn’t last forever, and Jefferson eventually pulled open the back door to get at where he’d stashed his luggage, raising an eyebrow at Alex, who still hadn’t left the car, “Coming?”

“‘Course I’m coming,” Alex grumbled, following out of the car and groaning at the stiffness in his limbs. He quickly followed suit in grabbing his own few bags from the back.

Once they’d both grabbed their bags, Alex followed Jefferson up to the door, feeling extremely apprehensive about this whole situation. Jefferson rang the doorbell, and almost immediately the door was flung open by a teenage girl. Alex was mildly surprised that it hadn’t been a butler or something just based on the looks of the house, but he was even more surprised when the girl practically tackled Jefferson into a hug. Though he supposed he shouldn’t have been surprised given that everything he’d heard from Jefferson gave the impression that they were an affectionate family, or in other words, a family that was everything Alexander wasn’t prepared to handle. He stood off to the side, shuffling his feet slightly while he pretended not to be uncomfortable. He tried not to watch or listen to the interaction, feeling like he was intruding.

“Anna, this is Alexander. Alexander, Anna,” Alex looked at them again once Jefferson spoke, seeing that they were no longer hugging, but both still had residual smiles on their faces.

“So you’re the mysterious fiancé,” Anna commented, pulling her attention away from Jefferson to look Alex up and down, seemingly taking him in.

“That’s me,” Alex replied, pasting on his most charming smile. Yes, he was uncomfortable, but he still wanted to be likeable to Jefferson’s family. Fortunately, Anna seemed to buy it, smiling back at him.

“Where’s Mama?” Jefferson cut into the interaction to ask.

“In the parlor, last I saw,” Anna replied, “I’ll tell her you’re here.” With that, she was off, heading, presumably, in the direction of the parlor. Alex’s smile fell almost instantly once she was gone. Jefferson noticed, looking at him with what Alex would have classified as concern if it weren’t for the strong dislike he knew was between them.

“Are you alright?” Jefferson asked, sounding unsure, like he wasn’t sure if he should be asking or not.

“Obviously,” Alex snapped back, instantly on the defensive.

“Okay,” Jefferson replied, probably not wanting to start something where his family might hear, just suggesting “let’s go put our stuff in our room, then we can find Mama in the parlour.”

Alex nodded and soon enough he found himself following Jefferson through the opulent halls. The more he saw of the house, the more it screamed of wealth, but in a subtle, old money sort of way. When they got to Jefferson’s room, he couldn’t help but stop and stare around in awe for a second. It was in keeping with the theme of the rest of the house, all elegant decor and furniture, giant bed in the center of the room. But what caught his eye was the wall that was covered practically floor to ceiling with bookshelves, all stuffed to the brim with various volumes.

Jefferson followed his gaze and promptly smirked, “If you think that’s impressive, you should see my library at Monticello.”

“I never said it was impressive,” Alexander countered, though weakly. He was practically salivating at the possibility of getting to go through Jefferson’s library. Monticello was near here, wasn’t it?

Jefferson just tossed his bags next to the bed, gesturing for Alex to do the same, likely impatient to go see his family. Alex would feel bad denying him that, seeing how happy it made him, so he quickly copied the action, despite the discomfort he knew was impending for himself.

“C’mon, Mama will be dying to meet you,” Jefferson said, slight sarcasm in his voice as he was fully aware of the irony of the situation.

“Let’s go then,” Alex replied, and quickly found himself following Jefferson back through the same long hallways. 

Whatever Alex had expected Jefferson’s mother to be like, this wasn’t it. He’d pictured a little old southern lady, likely with a strict and religious attitude. He hadn’t pictured a kind looking middle aged looking woman who looked at the two of them welcomingly and openly. Alex was prepared when she pulled Jefferson into a hug, as that seemed to be a common theme. What he wasn’t prepared for was being pulled into a hug himself directly afterwards. He tensed up immediately, but slowly relaxed into it, putting his arms hesitantly on her back.

“You must be Alexander,” she said, pulling back to look at him.

“And you must be Mrs. Jefferson,” he replied, putting on the same smile he’d put on for Anna.

“Oh, none of that, you call me Mama, or Jane, or whatever you’re comfortable with, but none of this ‘Mrs. Jefferson’ business, young man. We’re about to be family,” she told him, finally fully releasing him.

“Sure, ‘family’,” said an unfamiliar voice before Alex got the chance to reply. Alex turned around to see a teenage boy entering the parlor with Anna. He looked similar to Anna in age and appearance, so this was probably Randolph, Anna’s twin that Jefferson had told him about.

“Randy!” Anna said admonishingly, swatting at his arm.

“What? We don’t hear anything about this guy except how terrible he is and suddenly Tommy’s marrying him?” Jefferson shifted uncomfortably at being so directly called out.

“Nice to see you too, Randy,” Jefferson said pointedly.

“Be polite to your brother,” Mrs. Jefferson said warningly.

“Sorry,” Randy shrugged, not sounding entirely sorry. Though Alex was unbothered by him, since oddly enough, he hadn’t sounded entirely hostile, just pointing out the obvious facts of the situation, unwilling to let something go if it didn’t make sense. Alex could relate to him in that way.

What he was bothered by was Anna and Mrs. Jefferson’s easy acceptance of him. He couldn’t call her ‘Mama’ like she had asked, he would feel far too guilty. He was an intruder in their family dynamic. They thought he loved Jefferson, when he was really just here to use him. Even if it was somewhat justified by Jefferson using him in return, he hated being in the situation where he had to lie to them. 

Well, this certainly had the makings for a fun couple of weeks.

~~~

“This isn’t a date,” James blurted out before he could stop himself. 

“You’re right, it’s not,” Aaron replied evenly. His eyebrows were raised and he attempted to disguise his slight smirk by taking a sip of his coffee. 

James was mortified, both at his own presumptuous statement and Aaron’s calm response. Aaron had given absolutely no sign of treating this like a date, behaving in strictly a friendly way. He’d been the one to invite Aaron out for coffee, and he knew there was no way he would have mistaken it for a date after the last conversation they’d had. He’d invited him out to make it completely clear that their friendship wouldn’t be affected by any extenuating circumstances, for lack of a better word. He hadn’t wanted to lose Aaron over this. And here James was, making it awkward.

“I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have- that was stupid,” James stuttered out, avoiding eye contact and practically hiding behind his coffee cup. 

“It wasn’t stupid. You were making sure everything was clear between us after our last conversation. That’s understandable,” Aaron didn’t seem to have taken offense luckily, his slight smirk having softened into a small smile.

Aaron was too understanding, too considerate. That was the problem. He’d been rejected, and ever since, he hadn’t treated James any differently, continuing to offer him nothing but friendliness and support. Not that being able to handle rejection with maturity was something James considered a problem. But it certainly wasn’t making it any easier for him to understand his emotions. 

“I still shouldn’t have presumed,” James protested. 

“Maybe not. But we’ve cleared up what you wanted to clear up. As long as we’re still friends, I’m still happy,” Aaron replied easily. 

“Thank you,” James said, not knowing how else to respond besides with gratitude. 

“It’s no problem. Now, what do you say we talk about something a little lighter,” Aaron suggested. James nodded, all too happy to get off the topic.

Though it was a little more difficult to get his mind off the topic than it was to stop talking about it. Aaron was being perfectly mature and understanding about the situation, respecting all the boundaries of friendship that James set for them. He seemed perfectly content to forget all about what he’d admitted to James and move on. So why didn’t James want him to? He still had feelings for Thomas, he knew he did, or else he wouldn’t be thinking about his upcoming wedding so much. He didn’t think his feelings for Thomas would be something he would be able to let go of easily, and yet now, somehow, he was insecure in these feelings. In the past, his all consuming feelings for Thomas hadn’t left much room for feelings for anyone else, and he thought that was still true. So why did everything in him rebel at the thought of continuing being friends with Aaron without acknowledging what he now knew? 

The one thing that he did know for sure was that he was definitely going to need some time to sort all this out in his head.

~~~

As it turned out, Thomas’ fantasies of being able to get in any relaxation in the days before the wedding were nothing but blissful delusion. They’d spent every waking moment preparing, making sure everything they’d previously set up was still in order, and fixing the surprisingly large amount of last minute issues. The only thing that made it tolerable for Thomas was being in his home state with his family, and the knowledge that even more friends and family would be arriving tomorrow. Even if it would probably be exhausting having to introduce Hamilton to each and every one of them.

He didn’t anticipate having a moment where he wasn’t bogged down by exhaustion until the wedding was over. Having, at long last, finished everything that needed to be finished for the day, Thomas had simply flopped himself down on his stomach on the bed fully clothed. Hearing the bedroom door open, Thomas merely let out a groan, praying to any god that might be listening that there wouldn’t be some wedding related catastrophe he’d have to deal with.

“You alright there?” luckily, it was just Hamilton, though he didn’t appreciate the amusement in his voice.

“Yup,” he said simply, having no desire to elaborate.

“Really? So it’s normal for you to look this miserable and tired?” Hamilton asked. Thomas turned his head to meet his eyes, fully prepared to come back with some snarky comment, but he was surprised to see that underneath the sarcasm, Hamilton seemed surprisingly genuine.

“Yes it is,” Thomas declared, before giving in and giving him a genuine answer, “I’m just ready for this wedding to be over. I was looking forward to taking a break while we were down here, but I can’t take a break until we work out all the kinks of the wedding.”

“As far as everyone else is concerned, we’ll be working out kinks even after the wedding,” Hamilton delivered the line suggestively rather than replying to Thomas’ actual point.

Thomas spluttered momentarily, having no idea how to respond to that. Hamilton smirked at the reaction, but apparently thought nothing else of it, just climbing up on the bed next to Thomas and lying on his back. Thomas flipped over so he was lying on his back next to him.

“Seriously though,” Hamilton continued, “The wedding’s in a couple days, just make it to then and you’ll have a whole week to relax.”

“You’re probably right,” Thomas replied, sighing. He was home and he was with his family, those weren’t hardships. And Hamilton was right, he could relax all he wanted during their ‘honeymoon’, especially since they’d decided to just stay at Monticello rather than actually travel somewhere.

“I always am,” Hamilton said, smirking again. Thomas rolled his eyes, but he let the matter drop.

“Hey, did you know Washington decided to stay at Mount Vernon rather than here?” Thomas asked, having just remembered the information he’d learned earlier. It made no sense to him. Mount Vernon was a whole two hours from here, if Washington was coming to the wedding that would just be impractical. They’d offered a guest room to him and his wife, but they’d turned it down.

“I didn’t know that, but it does sorta make sense,” Hamilton replied, seeming unsurprised by the information.

“It does?” Thomas asked, not seeing how it made sense at all.

“Yeah, for him to not want to stay under the same roof as us?” Hamilton continued. Apprehension and- was that guilt? It was definitely guilt- seemed to dawn on Hamilton as Thomas continued not to comprehend his meaning, “Oh, did I not tell you?”

“No, you didn’t tell me,” Thomas said guardedly. He hadn’t even heard what Hamilton was going to say yet and he was already suspicious and on edge.

“Washington thinks you’re just using me for your career,” Hamilton sounded awfully calm for someone who had just dropped a bombshell like that on him. 

“What? And you didn’t think that was important to tell me?” Thomas exclaimed, instantly sitting up, too agitated and furious to remain lying down. Hamilton was supposed to be improving Washington’s opinion of him, not making it worse. The entire reason Thomas was going through with this wedding was for the sake of his career. At this point in time, it would be incredibly difficult to pull out of the wedding, after all the preparation they’d done, but how was he supposed to go through with it when it was causing him to actively work against his main goal.

“Look, relax,” Hamilton sat up as well, obviously trying to appease him, “we just won’t talk about your career to him for a while, he can't be suspicious forever.”

“Don’t tell me to relax! You’re aware that if he does in fact stay suspicious forever, I’m going to have to divorce you,” not that he didn’t have any sympathy for Hamilton’s situation, but he wasn’t going to stay trapped in a relationship that was actively harming him and holding him back.

Hamilton’s face paled slightly as a thought seemed to cross his mind, “If you divorced me, you wouldn’t tell people about..”

“No, of course I wouldn’t tell people about your citizenship. Whatever you might think, I’m not actually a terrible person,” Thomas didn’t even know why he was so hurt at the thought that Hamilton might worry that Thomas could expose him. They weren’t exactly friends, it was probably a very legitimate fear as far as Hamilton was concerned.

“I don’t think you’re a terrible person,” Hamilton told him, face mostly blank, though it looked like it took him a great deal of effort to say. Thomas gave him a hard, searching look, but eventually shook his head.

“Whatever you say, Hamilton,” with that, he laid back down on the bed on his back. He felt Hamilton lay down too, but he kept his gaze fixed on the ceiling, not speaking, feeling twice as exhausted as he had before.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading!


	7. You may kiss the groom

Alex had no intention of admitting how anxious he was. He’d somehow managed to avoid the necessity of acting overly affectionate with Jefferson, mostly because of how busy they had both been. But it was Friday, meaning their wedding was tomorrow, and people tended to act more than a little affectionate towards their partner when they were getting married. On top of that, the rest of the Jefferson siblings would be arriving today, along with his own friends, all of whom would expect some affection between them. What was he supposed to do if Jefferson’s siblings suspected something, or thought he wasn’t good for Jefferson?

Regardless, he couldn’t put off going downstairs for much longer. Jefferson was down there already, in the parlor, because apparently that was the place the Jefferson family gathered to talk to people. He could only pretend to be getting ready for so long, since in theory he was just supposed to be changing, so he gathered himself and went downstairs. He still didn’t know his way around a lot of the house, but he could at least find his way to the parlor by now.

When he arrived, it was unsurprisingly already fairly full of people. Anna and Randolph were both sitting down with Jefferson. Mrs. Jefferson, or Jane as he was meant to be calling her, was sitting with a woman and a young girl, neither of whom Alex recognized.

Jefferson jumped up when he noticed Alex had entered and guided him by the hand to where the woman and the child were sitting and talking to Mrs. Jefferson. 

“Alex, this is my sister, Martha, and my niece, Lucy. Mary and Lucy, this is my fiancé, Alex,” Jefferson introduced them and Alex fixed a smile onto his face.

“It’s nice to meet you both,” Alex said. The only thing comforting him was that he was pretty sure he appeared less awkward than he felt. Jefferson took that moment to interlock their fingers and Alex just barely stopped himself from tensing up. 

“It’s nice to meet you too,” Mary said simply, giving him a searching look that made Alex uncomfortable but not saying anything further. She just stood up and offered her hand for Alex to shake, which he did. He was absurdly grateful that she hadn’t gone in for the hug like Mrs. Jefferson had.

“Lucy, what do we say?” she said, her attention immediately off of him as she turned to address her daughter, who looked maybe eight or nine at the most.

“Nice to meet you,” Lucy said quietly, clearly not a big fan of talking to strangers. Which wasn’t exactly useful to Alex since he had approximately no experience with kids. 

Luckily, Martha spoke up again before Alex had to formulate a response, “You’ll have to forgive my husband for not being here, he’ll be here for the ceremony, but he couldn’t seem to drag himself away from his work.”

“I’m sure Alex can relate to that a little too much,” Jefferson said jokingly. Alex got offended on instinct before he recognized the warmth in Jefferson’s tone, which felt more than a little weird, at which point he just huffed and swatted at his shoulder.

“I have no clue what you’re talking about,” he said, putting focused effort into making sure his tone was equally as warm. Martha just laughed.

The next few hours seemed to exist outside of time, whipping by and yet taking far too long. A seemingly endless parade of Jefferson’s relatives arrived, most of which were siblings, siblings in law, and nieces and nephews. There were far too many for him to keep track of, but he still played the part, sticking close to Jefferson and chatting pleasantly with his relatives.

The only bright side were some of Alex’s own friends making an appearance. Most of them had opted to arrive tomorrow or late tonight so they could still get in the day at work, but the Schuylers had arrived today and opted to come and meet the Jeffersons. 

The Schuylers showed no sign of any suspicion about their relationship and didn't act strangely at all. Eliza, who had an affinity for children that Alex did not share, had managed to make fast friends with Lucy and the others, while Peggy spent a lot of time talking to the twins, since they were the closest people there to her age. Angelica was already friendly with Jefferson, so she stuck around him and Alex for a majority of the time, something Alex was grateful for because it meant that she could draw attention away from him in conversations. He normally would be all over being the center of attention in a conversation, but that was far less the case when he was meant to be acting like he was in love with Jefferson. 

Overall, a day spent greeting guests and meeting Jeffersons was tolerable. It was not something he would like to repeat, mostly because of the sheer volume of people, but for the most part, the Jeffersons were likeable and good people, so he couldn’t complain. Well, he could still complain about having to lie to them, but that was a different story entirely.

~~~

Thomas was in a surprisingly good mood given the circumstances. He’d spent the entire day lying to the faces of his family, he was aware of that. But it had been a while since he’d even seen his family all together, so he couldn’t help but enjoy himself, despite everything. 

Something told him Hamilton couldn’t say the same. They’d gone back to their room for the night when it had started getting late and Thomas had spent more than enough time catching up with his family. Hamilton was sitting on the bed with his laptop out in front of him, which wasn’t unusual in and of itself, Hamilton being the workaholic that he was. But he wasn’t actually typing anything and Thomas knew for a fact he didn’t actually have any work to get done this week or next. Thomas’ best guess was that he was trying and failing to distract himself.

“What’re you doing?” Thomas asked, coming to sit beside him. He didn’t want to directly ask if he was okay because he honestly didn’t know how Hamilton would react to a question like that. He’d probably say he was fine or that it was none of his business.

“None of your business,” Hamilton snapped, though it lacked heat and sounded like it was said out of reflex more than anything. Thomas just shrugged it off considering finding out what he was doing on his laptop wasn’t exactly his original goal. 

He let the silence stretch out for another moment, staring straight ahead rather than looking at Hamilton, before eventually continuing, “You know, it’s still not too late if you want to back out of this.”

Hamilton just snorted in response, “Sure.”

“Really, I mean it. I mean, I know this isn’t an ideal situation, but you’ve seemed especially uncomfortable,” Thomas had thrown his subtle method out the window by now. Subtle never worked with Hamilton, anyways. Hamilton sighed and closed his laptop to turn and look at him, Thomas meeting his eyes.

“Of course I’m uncomfortable. Marrying you wasn’t exactly what I’d envisioned for myself,” Hamilton’s words had a bite to them, but Thomas just raised his eyebrows until he continued, “But I don’t exactly have a choice. There aren’t any other options.”

“You’re Alexander Hamilton. You could find another option if you really needed to,” Thomas told him.

“Was that a compliment?” Hamilton smirked, instantly latching onto that aspect of the statement.

“No,” Thomas said simply, rolling his eyes as he did.

“Really? Because it really seemed like one,” Hamilton said, pushing it further, the smirk intensifying. 

“That wasn’t my point, Hamilton,” Thomas said, voice hard.

“Right,” Hamilton seemed to deflate slightly when Thomas didn’t engage in whatever sort of banter he was trying to start, “Trust me, I’m as comfortable as I could possibly be, given the circumstances.”

Thomas nodded at the serious response and Hamilton opened his laptop back up, promptly ignoring Thomas again. Thomas snuck a glance over his shoulder just out of curiosity to see that he was open to some news article about the upcoming election. Probably didn’t want to stop being informed just because he was getting married. Hamilton shot him a glare when he noticed Thomas reading over his shoulder and Thomas shrugged unapologetically before plucking a book off of his nightstand to read.

A few minutes passed in a surprisingly companionable silence before Hamilton decided to break it, “You don’t have to do this either, you know.”

Thomas looked up from his book, watching Hamilton’s face even though Hamilton was still staring fixedly at the computer screen as he continued, “I know you’re benefiting from this career wise, but it’s still your family we’re lying to.”

Hamilton looked up and met his eyes as Thomas adopted a sardonic smile, “It’s the world we’re lying to. I’m fine, Hamilton.”

Hamilton just shrugged and went back to his laptop, actually typing this time. Thomas didn’t know what he was typing and he didn’t ask, taking that to signal the end of their conversation. 

~~~

James is Thomas’ best man, because of course he is. Sure, he and Thomas had hardly spoken for almost a month at this point because Thomas seemed to only have time for Hamilton these days, but they were still best friends, right?

James really wasn’t a bitter person, or at least he tried not to be. But he felt like he could be forgiven for being a little upset about this situation. Forget his longtime feelings for Thomas and whatever jealousy that might have produced. At this point, he didn’t even care about that. He just missed his friend. 

But he also understood that this situation wasn’t exactly easy for Thomas, making this huge life altering decision and dealing with all the effects and consequences. So James would of course still be there for him in whatever capacity he was needed, even if it turned out he wasn’t actually needed very much at all.

Right now, what Thomas needed him to do was wear this suit with the stupid magenta bowtie that he and the other groomsmen, who were mostly Thomas’ relatives, had to wear. And Thomas needed him to stand with the other groomsmen and watch him get married. And since that was what Thomas needed, that was what James was doing.

The ceremony really was beautiful. Every detail was clearly planned out, maybe not painstakingly, considering the time frame it had been planned, but definitely with thought put into making it look both genuine and beautiful. They were on the grounds of Monticello, because of course they were. A lot of the decor clearly had Thomas’ influence, being in shades of white and light purples and pinks that complemented his completely flashy magenta suit. Even the wedding arch had a few purple flowers wound into it. But of course it couldn’t be Hamilton’s wedding without him leaving his touch on it as well. He wore an equally flashy suit, except his was a green that completely stood out against the delicate pinks and purples that seemed to be the theme of the wedding. His groomsmen and women (he’d refused to exclude the Schuylers just because they happened to be female) were also wearing the same shade of green, and there were several large bunches of balloons in shades of green tied down behind the rows of chairs. He couldn’t see Thomas agreeing to those considering he’d always said balloons were tacky to have at events that weren’t aimed at children, plus they didn’t even match the rest of the decor, but James supposed he must have if they were there. 

James didn’t recognize the man officiating the ceremony, but that was the least of his worries. His eyes were fixed directly on the back of Thomas’ head, since that was all he could see of him. He’d looked at Hamilton for a moment, but when his gaze had seemed too intense and intimately focused on Thomas, James felt like he was intruding by continuing to watch. He wondered if Thomas’ acting was half as good.

The flowery words of the officiant started to blur together after a while, and James couldn’t help but zone out and get lost in his own head for a while. Eventually, Hamilton began speaking. These must be the vows. James still wasn’t entirely listening, but he was sure whatever Hamilton had come up with to say would be beautiful and poetic and above all fake.

James’ gaze wandered out into the audience as Hamilton’s vows went on for quite a while. He scanned the crowd, not quite admitting to himself that he was looking for a specific person. Distantly, he registered Hamilton’s voice stopping and being replaced by Thomas’, but still he kept scanning the crowd. Eventually, his gaze landed on Aaron, and he somehow wasn’t quite surprised to find that Aaron had already been looking at him. They locked eyes and James’ lips involuntarily quirked up in a smile, which Aaron returned immediately.

The words, “You may kiss the groom,” barely registered in James’ mind, but he whipped his head around just in time to witness the kiss.

Everything was a bit of a blur after that, with the officiant pronouncing them married, the clapping from the audience, and then the slow transition to the reception inside Monticello. But in the blur, one thing struck James. He’d been standing next to his best friend, his best friend who he was meant to be in love with. He’d been standing right next to him while he kissed and consequently married Alexander Hamilton, of all people. It should have destroyed him, and yet, the one thing he’d focused on, had wanted, was to find Aaron in the crowd.

~~~

Catching up with his large family was one thing. There were a lot of them, but at least Thomas knew they loved him. He didn’t feel judged by them. The wedding reception was a whole different story. Monticello was seemingly filled to the brim with his family, but also with family friends, acquaintances, colleagues, plus Hamilton’s friends who he knew for a fact didn’t even like him. His every move was being watched and judged, and celebration or not, he just wanted to get out of there.

Another issue was that he couldn’t seem to keep track of Hamilton. A just married couple was expected to greet the guests together, as a couple. That was kind of the entire point of a reception. And yet, every time Thomas turned his back or went to go get a drink, Hamilton disappeared somewhere. Sure, Thomas was probably smothering him, but there would be plenty of time to worry about whether or not they were smothering each other when their every move wasn’t being watched by all these guests. The amount of time they were spending separate was frankly suspicious, but Thomas was being treated like an unwanted yet determined stray puppy. He’d be ditched somewhere by himself and have to go hunt Hamilton down, only to be met with his poorly hidden annoyance. It wasn’t exactly normal for the groom to be constantly annoyed when in the presence of the other groom. People would talk, were probably already talking, and there wasn’t much Thomas could actually do about it.

Currently, he was scanning the crowds of people, some dancing and some not, trying to reunite with his husband if only for the sake of appearance, a glass of champagne clutched tightly in his hand. Finally, he spotted him in a corner, talking animatedly to Washington. Thomas made his way straight there, pushing his way through the crowd in the politest way possible.

A thought crossed his mind as he walked. Washington suspected that his love for Hamilton was fake. Maybe he could use the opportunity to convince him otherwise. If he and Hamilton acted comfortable together and loving enough towards each other, he might end up back in Washington’s good graces.

“Hey, Alex,” he said as affectionately as possible, approaching from behind and snaking an arm around Hamilton’s waist. Hamilton didn’t react normally, because of course he didn’t. Instead, he cut himself off mid sentence and jumped practically a foot into the air, mild panic in his eyes, though he quickly schooled his expression back to normal. Well, that absolutely didn’t go as planned. They clearly should have practiced being more comfortable with each other, Hamilton couldn’t look so panicked every time Thomas touched him unexpectedly.

“Hello, Thomas,” Washington greeted him, coolly polite, and of course Washington hadn’t missed that little moment. He’d seen Hamilton’s discomfort and was going to hold that against Thomas no matter what he said. It only fit into the narrative that Washington was coming up with about Thomas, that he wasn’t good for Hamilton and was doing this all for himself.

“Hi,” Hamilton eventually returned the greeting, and when the moment couldn’t get any more awkward, launched right back into what he’d been saying to Washington. Apparently he was begging to be allowed to do work remotely over their honeymoon. Washington was listening indulgently, but his attention was focused largely on Thomas, silent threats clear as he stared at where Thomas’ arm was still around Hamilton’s waist. Well, Thomas knew where he wasn’t wanted, appearances be damned.

He waited for a lull in Hamilton’s impromptu speech before cutting in, “Hey, I’ll catch up with you later, alright?” He didn’t actually wait for Hamilton to respond, just letting go and making his way off into the crowd, leaving him and Washington be. He could feel Washington’s eyes on his back as he walked away.

He eventually decided to go and find James instead. At least he knew James wouldn’t be actively trying to give him the slip. It didn’t take him very long to see him and Aaron standing next to each other at the edge of the room, the both of them looking out over the room as they sipped champagne and spoke to each other. Thomas wasted no time in starting to make his way over there. But as he got closer, something in their demeanor stopped him. They were standing awfully close together and the longer they talked, the more they turned to face each other more directly. Neither of them were very expressive people, but the subtle intensity they met each other’s eyes with made Thomas feel like he’d be intruding on something if he interrupted. So he didn’t.

He turned around and started walking pretty much at random, not really having any sort of goal anymore. Surely in this crowd of people, most of whom were his guests, he could find someone to talk to. But most of them didn’t even know him that well and would most likely just congratulate him and immediately inquire about the whereabouts of Hamilton, which he was not prepared to deal with. He supposed he should at least have an idea of where he was in case someone asked, so he looked over to where he’d been standing with Washington to check that he was still there. Unsurprisingly, he wasn't. Well, that was fine, not like he needed to know where his husband was during their literal wedding reception or anything.

Thomas changed his path to head for the bathroom. Not that he actually needed to use it, but it wasn’t like he had anything better to do, so he might as well at least make it look like he was going somewhere with a purpose so no one would try to talk to him.

Just as he was about to leave the room, he heard voices from the hallway leading to the bathroom, seeing two figures, one of which being unmistakably John Laurens, saying, “I understand this is an inappropriate time and place, sir, but I’m worried about Alex.”

Making a split second decision, Thomas stepped out of view quickly, standing to the side of the entryway. He wasn’t visible, but he could still hear their voices. He knew he shouldn’t be eavesdropping, but they were talking about Hamilton. He needed to make sure they weren’t suspicious. 

There was a heavy sigh, “I understand. I’m worried too. But we should discuss this at another time, maybe when we aren’t at Alex’s wedding.” It was Washington.

“What better time to discuss it? Alex might have just ruined his life,” Laurens was pleading, sounding genuinely distressed. Did they really hate Thomas that much?

“I don’t trust Thomas either, but at this very moment, the best we can do is be there to support Alex,” Washington told Laurens. 

“But what if he’s only doing this for his career? I have to talk to Alex,” Laurens continued.

“If he’s doing this for his career, he’ll soon find out it’s not working,” Washington said calmly.

“You mean you’re not going to offer him a cabinet position?” Laurens asked. It was pretty common knowledge that was what Thomas was striving for, but it was pretty forward of Laurens to outright ask a question like that considering he hardly had a right to the information, so Thomas honestly didn’t expect an answer. 

“No, I’m not,” Washington said it easily, as if it were hardly a question. Thomas shouldn’t have hoped for any different. He should have known that this marriage could only do damage, no one would ever believe that he would be with Hamilton for any unselfish reasons. Apparently he was just that untrustworthy.

He didn’t need to hear any more, he had all the information he needed. His career was destroyed. He didn’t know what else he could do about it at this point. What he needed to do now was cut his ties with Hamilton as soon as he could and see if he could go about rebuilding his career. He’d have to quit his job with Washington, it was obviously a dead end. There must be some other way he could get ahead.

Thomas was in a dark mood for the rest of the party, merely waiting for it to be over so he could talk to Hamilton alone. He needed to be updated on what Thomas had found out. When it got dark outside, Thomas figured this would be when guests finally started to leave. But all in a rush, his mother ushered first him and Hamilton, and then all the other guests out onto the grounds. Thomas just let it happen, not bothering to try and figure out what was going on.

After a few minutes of waiting and people shuffling around, Hamilton actually wound up next to him for once. When his Mama excitedly directed them to look into the sky a distance away, Thomas followed the instruction. Soon enough, the sky was alight with sparking colors as a display of fireworks began. Thomas couldn’t help but smile.

Beautiful as the display was, it wasn’t long before he started to feel eyes landing on him and Hamilton. No doubt the crowd expected they’d kiss or something. Kissing under a sky lit by fireworks, what a romantic idea. Well, they’d hardly lived up to expectations the rest of the night thanks to Hamilton, so Thomas figured there was no reason to break that pattern now. He didn’t bother to take his eyes off the fireworks.

And then he felt a hand on his cheek, tilting his head down. Not about to struggle against the touch in front of everyone, he let it happen easily, meeting Hamilton’s eyes, watching the blue and red lights dance across his face.

And then they were kissing. Thomas hardly had time to process it before it was over, partially because it was a relatively short and chaste kiss, partially because it had simply short circuited his brain.

And then Hamilton was letting go of his face, turning his gaze back to the sky like nothing had happened. But Thomas was still practically in shock. While Hamilton watched the fireworks with seemingly no problem, Thomas could only watch them reflected back in Hamilton’s eyes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for reading!


	8. I'll Call You Thomas

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This fic hit the 100 kudos milestone! Thank you all!

It was late at night when all the guests were finally cleared out of Monticello, some heading home and some heading to spend the night at Shadwell. Some of his relatives had volunteered to take down the decorations, so he and Hamilton had gone inside to go to bed, since they’d be staying here for the next week as their ‘honeymoon’.

His room at Monticello was much the same as the one at Shadwell, if a bit larger considering he actually owned Monticello and had chosen one of the nicer rooms for himself. They’d already changed out of their wedding clothes and Hamilton had tucked himself into the bed without a word to Thomas. But Thomas was getting antsy sitting on the knowledge he had of Washington’s plans, and he figured it was probably best to rip off the bandaid and tell Hamilton as soon as possible.

“Hamilton,” he sat on the other side of the bed, trying to get his attention.

“Fuck off,” he grumbled.

“You fuck off, it’s important,” Thomas replied, not backing down. 

Hamilton grumbled a little more but eventually sat up to face him, looking at him expectantly. 

“I overheard Washington talking about how he doesn’t trust me,” he began.

He fully intended to go on to tell him how Washington was planning on leaving him out of the cabinet and how he couldn’t stay in a relationship that was cursing him to lose the trust of the man who was more than likely the future president. But when Thomas spoke, he watched Hamilton’s guard go up in the blink of an eye, saw the anxiety in his expression for the split second before he successfully hid it. He knew where a sentence like that was going. Thomas had outright told him that if the marriage did more harm than good for his career, he was going to break it off. And he hadn’t even told Hamilton the worst of it. For all he’d talked about being sure Hamilton would be able to find another option, after all the time they’d wasted banking on the marriage plan working, that might not be the case. There was a good chance that in divorcing him, Thomas would be leaving him to the mercy of the immigration courts, leaving him to lose everything he’d worked for. Thomas couldn’t bring himself to shatter the hope that Hamilton had. He might not agree with him politically, but even he could see that he had built up too much for himself to warrant throwing it all away, and Thomas didn’t want to be the person responsible for making him do so. So in a split second, he changed his mind about where to lead this conversation.

“We’re going to need to figure out a way to play this up more, do something to convince him this is real and I’m not just playing you,” Thomas said, rather than revealing that his career with Washington was gone no matter what they did.

“Well how do you suggest we do that? Any stunt we might pull would be too obviously for the purpose of gaining his trust,” Hamilton pointed out, though he seemed marginally more relaxed now that he knew for sure Thomas wasn’t about to call the whole thing off. Little did he know.

“You could try to relax, for one,” Thomas suggested, keeping his voice as even as possible so Hamilton couldn’t take it as an attack. Which didn’t work very well at all considering how he immediately went on the defensive.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” he snapped.

“You flinch every time I touch you, that looks more than a little suspicious. Not to mention you kept ditching me at the reception,” Thomas pointed out.

“Yeah, I kept ditching you, because newsflash, it’s not fucking easy to keep playing pretend with someone who hates you. Forgive me if sometimes I’d rather just not. And it’s not like you’re a saint of a partner either, don’t kid yourself into thinking you’re a perfect actor,” well, Thomas had successfully enraged Hamilton, even if that hadn’t actually been his goal.

“You know I don’t actually hate you, I was just trying to make a suggestion so this would work out better,” Thomas tried to explain.

“No, I don’t know that you don’t hate me, when have you ever given any indication of that?” Hamilton demanded. If there was anything that very obviously indicated Thomas’ lack of hatred towards him, it was the fact that he couldn’t bring himself to call off the marriage and leave Hamilton stranded. But it’s not like Hamilton could have known that considering he’d apparently already decided against telling him that.

“I guess I haven’t. But if I really hated you, I wouldn’t have agreed to any of this,” Thomas didn’t even entirely know why he was pushing this particular point so hard.

“I guess not,” Hamilton conceded, most of his defensiveness evaporating, though he still didn’t seem entirely convinced.

“Maybe this is what the problem is,” Thomas said, suddenly having an epiphany.

“What is?”

“We’re stuck in our habits of hating each other, even when we’re supposed to be acting in love. So it’s less believable when we’re acting. Nothing seems natural,” Thomas pointed.

“So you want to make it more believable, what, by dating?” Hamilton seemed incredulous at the idea.

“No,” Thomas said, shooting down that assumption maybe a bit too quickly to be entirely normal, “But maybe we should try to be something closer to friends.”

“Friends,” Hamilton echoed, tone blank.

“Or not,” Thomas said quickly at the lack of a response. Truly, this was the opposite of the direction he should be going in. He should be reminding himself of all of Hamilton’s bad qualities so he wouldn’t feel bad about divorcing him. He shouldn’t be asking to be his friend, “That was stupid.”

“No, I guess it makes sense to get more comfortable with each other. We should have done this from the beginning, honestly,” Hamilton said, determination growing as the idea sank in. 

“Okay. Friends then, I guess,” Thomas said, smiling a little at the sheer absurdity.

“I guess,” Hamilton repeated, mirroring the smile, then “Are you going to let me go to bed now?”

Thomas snorted and gestured at him to lay back down, “Be my guest.”

~~~

They didn’t start getting along immediately just because Jefferson had suggested they be friends. That would have been too much to expect. To both of their credit, they did at least try, but they had too much of a history to be perfectly pleasant right off the bat. Case in point, their current discussion.

“What do you mean you’re working? Washington purposefully didn’t give you any work this week,” Jefferson sounded unreasonably agitated considering whether Alex worked or not had no affect on him. 

“I made my own work,” Alex replied, glaring at him for a quick second before going back to typing, refusing to get off the couch. He couldn’t stand to be idle when he could be doing something useful, so he’d taken to defending Washington against detractors in the media, through a series of essays and articles. Anonymously published of course, he couldn’t jeopardize his place in the cabinet if Washington disapproved.

“Well, how are we supposed to get friendly with each other if you spend the whole time working?” Jefferson asked, sighing.

“Feeling neglected already?” Alex smirked at him momentarily, but once again went back to looking at the computer immediately after, “Don’t kid yourself, we both know you’d be working too if you had something to do.”

“No, actually, I wouldn’t, because this is supposed to be a vacation. Not working is kind of the entire point,” he insisted.

“Well, I have work to do, and frankly, it’s easier to be friendly when we don’t spend too much time together, so I’m sure whatever you wanted me for, you can do it alone,” Alex thought he was being pretty reasonable. Getting along would supposedly lead to being more comfortable with each other, but frankly, getting along required not talking to each other. So if not talking to each other was required to get along, they should stay out of each other’s hair. 

“Don’t be stupid, the only way this is actually going to work is if we’re able to talk to each other. If we just ignore each other, we’ll be just as uncomfortable interacting in front of people. If you actually want this to work out, you’re not making a very good effort at showing it, Hamilton,” Jefferson spat his name like a curse, getting genuinely worked up. The temptation was there to say something sarcastic to get him worked up even further. Alex knew for a fact that no one could get under Jefferson’s skin the way he could. He could get him truly furiously mad and it wouldn’t even be that difficult. But they were supposed to be friendly with each other, and obviously Alex’s way was just going to cause more conflict. So for once, he actually employed his thought to word filter, resolving to save the insults that came to his head about Jefferson being clingy or needy for a different time.

“Alexander,” he corrected, instead of going off on him as he would have liked to.

“What?” Jefferson froze up a little, obviously unprepared for this turn of events.

“Or Alex, preferably. You know, if we’re supposed to be friends,” Alex added, looking up from his laptop to hold eye contact.

“Alex,” Jefferson repeated, as if saying a word in a foreign language for the first time.

“Yup,” Alex said. Jefferson was being a bit slow on the uptake, “And I’ll call you Thomas. Unless you prefer Tom. Tommy maybe?” Alex knew for a fact he didn’t let anyone but family call him Tom or Tommy, he was just trying to annoy him into acting like himself again. And evidently it had worked, considering how Jefferson’s face instantly wrinkled with distaste.

“Call me Thomas,” he said, seeming much less dumbstruck now.

“Thanks, I will. Now I’m gonna get back to working, if you don’t mind,” he said, then started typing again, making it clear that he intended to finish this whatever Jefferson said in response. Or whatever Thomas said, he supposed.

He didn’t even need to look up to interpret the heavy silence for what it meant. Thomas was getting ready to argue with him again, “Look, wait a couple of hours and I’ll have dinner with you, okay?”

There was a tense moment and a sigh before Thomas finally replied, “Fine. But don’t think you’re getting out of this.”

“Alright,” Alex agreed readily, hiding his amusement at how surprisingly easy it had been to work that out between them, especially with Thomas mostly conceding to him in the end. Though privately, he’d decided he’d have to make more time for Thomas if that kept him happy. He didn’t want to upset him enough that he’d ask for a divorce, he knew that would be ruining himself career-wise.

Thomas had left the room while Alex was thinking, so he quickly set back to typing his article. He’d need to have it finished before dinner, after all.

~~~

James was anxious, even more anxious than he usually got when thinking about his love life. Mostly because normally, there wasn’t anything much to think about, considering his utter lack of a love life. He’d always been completely sure of where he stood, pining after Thomas while firmly remaining his friend and nothing more. And now there was actually something to be uncertain about. An unknown variable.

So he did the only thing he ever did when in situations like this- he went to Dolley’s Desserts. Currently he sat at one of the stools by the countertop, sipping a coffee quietly and watching from the corner of his eye as Dolley served pastry after pastry to other customers, generally getting lost in his own mind, going over the events of the wedding again and again in his head.

When there was a lull in customers, Dolley turned her head to face him, leaning forward up against the counter, “Alright, I know that look. What happened?”

James turned to face her with a smile, expression guarded, but half excited and half helplessly anxious, “I kissed him.”

Her expression immediately turned to one of shock, whipping herself around to fully face him head on, “You what?! Who? Thomas?”

James chuckled slightly at the assumption, “No. Aaron.” He’d been keeping her updated on the whole situation, so he knew about the conflict he’d been feeling on this topic. But he didn’t feel quite so conflicted anymore.

“Oh thank god,” Dolley said, apparently genuinely relieved, “I mean, no offense, but that makes things a lot less complicated.”

“How are things less complicated?” James asked, not personally finding this situation to be particularly straightforward.

“Firstly, kissing a married man would have definitely made things more complicated if it had been Thomas you kissed,” Dolley stated.

“Fair point.”

“I know. And secondly, you have feelings for Aaron, right?” she asked, smiling now.

“Yes,” James said simply. He’d accepted at this point that that was the only explanation for how strongly he’d been feeling about Aaron recently.

“And your feelings for Thomas are going away or gone? And you’ve been honest with Aaron about them?”

“Yes,” and Aaron was still remarkably understanding about everything.

“Then what’s the problem?”

“I..” What was the problem? Well, he was interested in Aaron and Aaron was interested in him. His feelings for Thomas might have been a problem, but they were mostly faded by this point, and Aaron knew about and accepted them, or at least was content in the knowledge that they were almost gone, “Well, I guess there really isn’t one.” Just his own mind getting in his way.

“Great! Now that that’s out of the way, you need to tell me everything,” Dolley insisted. Another customer had walked in and she turned to help them, but she still kept half an eye on James, obviously still expecting him to explain. 

So he did. He told her about locking eyes with Aaron during the ceremony, about seeking him out during the reception. How they’d just talked and drank fancy champagne for hours, inching ever closer through the course of the night. How Aaron had eventually convinced him into a dance, how Aaron had held him in his arms as they locked eyes until it didn’t even matter that they were at Thomas’ wedding because Aaron was all James could focus on. How James had finally gotten up the courage to lean forward and kiss him. How a genuine warm smile had lit up Aaron’s face and how James was helpless when faced with the beauty of it. Long story short, Dolley was subjected to some rather uncharacteristic gushing from James. 

He also told her how he and Aaron hadn’t been in contact in the days since. Knowing Aaron, he was waiting for James to seek him out first, likely wanting to make sure James didn’t think the kiss had been a mistake, not forcing his company on James in case it was unwanted. And James hadn’t been able to work up the courage to let him know he didn’t think it was a mistake at all.

“So you’re telling me you had a night that special, and you just haven’t contacted him since?” Dolley sounded rather skeptical of his life choices.

“Well, yeah, but I just don’t want to mess anything up,” James said, slightly defensively.

“James, the only way you can mess up in this situation is by talking yourself out of calling him,” she told him.

“You think?”

“I know. Aaron’s scary patient, but still, if I were you I wouldn’t make him wait too long,” she advised.

“You know what, I think I might- I need to-”

“Go,” Dolley smiled at him and he smiled back, getting up and heading for the door, phone already half out of his pocket.

~~~

Thomas had spent a while debating what he should make for dinner, assuming that Alex wouldn’t be having much to do with it considering he was working- and wasn’t it strange that he was calling him Alex now? He supposed it was a step in a positive direction.

In the end, the decision wasn’t very difficult. He didn’t want it to be anything like the stiff formal dinner they’d had with James back when this arrangement was merely a concept. He wanted this dinner to be more friendly now that they were somewhat of a team, or at least meant to be acting like one. And maybe if he became friends with him, and they formed some sort of bond, he could at least justify to himself staying married despite the harm it was doing to his career. So he made the friendliest meal he knew of. Though apparently, Alex didn’t have the same opinion of it that he did.

“I had to come out here just to eat mac and cheese with you? Mac and cheese isn’t a meal you eat with people, it’s a meal you scarf down before your next lecture because you have neither the time nor the money for anything else. But neither of us are in college anymore,” he was definitely judging Thomas, but at least he was still eating the mac and cheese, so Thomas chose not to take it personally. They’d chosen to eat in the living room rather than at the table, so Thomas relaxed back into the armchair he was seated on and balanced his bowl on his lap better before taking another bite. Alex was seated on the couch.

“It’s a comfort food,” Thomas insisted.

“What, you need comfort or something?” Alex asked skeptically.

“No. But hey, at least it’s not just kraft,” It was true. There wasn’t even any kraft mac and cheese stored in the Monticello kitchens, so he hadn’t even really had a choice but to make some scratch.

Alex just scoffed, but he didn’t take the opportunity to insult Thomas’ cooking, and coming from Alex, the lack of an insult was basically the equivalent of a compliment. 

A silence fell, and it suddenly occurred to Thomas how awkward this was. They had agreed to be friendlier towards each other, which generally meant less arguing, but arguing came naturally in their relationship. He almost didn’t know how to interact with him when he had to actively think about being friendly.

“How long do you think this arrangement will need to last?” Alex asked, not looking at Thomas, the question coming seemingly out of nowhere.

“I don’t know. For long enough after you become a citizen that no one suspects anything when we divorce,” Thomas said, shrugging.

“But I’m becoming a citizen almost directly after we get married. Someone could comment on that timing even if we don’t get divorced for another fifty years,” there was a complete mood shift as Alex pointed this out, seemingly despairing.

“We might as well just stay married then,” Thomas was attempting to joke, but it fell exceptionally flat if the glare Alex shot him was anything to go by.

“Obviously not,” he replied, looking almost disgusted at the thought of being married to Thomas for longer than necessary. Thomas tried not to take offense considering the circumstances, but it was somewhat difficult.

“Obviously not,” he repeated, just for the sake of confirming that he’d been joking, “We’ll figure it out when the time comes.” Alex just gave him a look saying that that answer was far from satisfactory, but Thomas didn’t have any better suggestions. He just went back to eating his mac and cheese, the already awkward mood of the meal further ruined by the exchange.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have a question for anyone who feels like answering it. Should I take the Thomas/James tag out? Obviously nothing comes of James being into Thomas in this, so I don't want anyone to go looking for Jeffmads and be disappointed when they find this instead.


	9. There isn't exactly a 'me and Alex'

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> First off, I'm sorry it took me so long to update, I got pretty caught up with life and school and stuff. Plus, I got the idea for a different fic and accidentally wrote the whole thing instead of updating this. Oops? Anyway, I've only posted the first chapter of that one so far, but it'll be getting regular updates since it's prewritten, so if you like my writing, maybe you could check out that story too? It's got mind control and a modernized revolutionary war, so if that sounds like your cup of tea? No pressure though.
> 
> Anyway, thanks for reading, I hope you enjoy!

The rest of their honeymoon was awkward. Alex simply couldn’t think of any other way to put it. Coexisting with Jefferson- who he’d been attempting to refer to as Thomas more recently- with this new dynamic was strange. It was like Thomas was pushing to make sure they spent time together while actively being as distant as possible at the same time. Sometimes Alex was convinced that Thomas was hiding something from him, but he’d never outright done anything to suggest that might be true. It was just a hunch Alex had, so he never actually brought it up.

Alexander had been working a lot, even over the honeymoon, because of course he had. Getting work done was familiar. It felt like something he could control in a situation that was completely unfamiliar. 

Thomas, for his part, had been sticking to his word about using this time to relax. Alex saw him around, lounging and reading books and generally not being productive. Sure, he had every right not to be productive while on vacation, but Alex was surprised that he hadn’t even mentioned work a single time, or been inclined to engage in the conversation when Alex did. He was doing anything and everything to fill the time, but work never factored in. He’d even seen him outside gardening once, even though he most definitely had groundskeepers for that sort of thing. It was strange. Or maybe Alex was the one that was strange, he didn’t know.

Their different choices of activity meant they didn’t spend too much time together during the day, though Thomas was oddly insistent that the two of them have dinner together each day. Dinner that Thomas usually prepared considering Alex had never really learned to cook besides the basics.

The dinners were fine, and they could hold conversations during them, but it still felt like Thomas was being distant. He didn’t feel like he could call it a friendship, despite the fact that they’d both agreed to make it one.

But he never brought it up, and the days passed rather quickly, all things considered. Before Alex knew it, he was looking at another six hours in the car with Thomas before they’d go back to their normal lives. Or whatever semblance of their normal lives they were able to get back to considering they were now married.

Thomas still seemed distant as he got behind the wheel of the car and started driving. He didn’t seem upset or anything, he just seemed almost disconnected from the situation.

“So, you’ve been acting strange lately,” Alex commented bluntly.

“Strange how?” Thomas asked, raising an eyebrow in response.

“Strange like.. Strange,” Alex replied, doing a splendidly horrible job of explaining the disconnect he was noticing, especially for someone who normally had such a way with words.

“Riveting observation,” Thomas said dryly.

“Strange like you’ve been distant,” Alex added. Which he still didn’t think was the best explanation because, distant in comparison to what? It wasn’t like there had ever been any closeness for Alex to compare Thomas’ current attitude to.

“Of course I’ve been distant. We’re trying to act friendly when we’ve never gotten along before. How do you expect me to act?” Thomas replied.

“We’re supposed to be acting like friends. I mean, you’re friends with Madison, and when you’re with him, you-”

“Are you really comparing our relationship to mine and James’? We’re best friends, and like I said, you and I barely get along. Of course I’m not going to treat you the same as him.”

Okay, sure, that was true. Alex was potentially coming off weirdly jealous by bringing up Thomas’ friendships like that. Thomas made a point, they wouldn’t be that close yet. But still, Thomas hadn’t acted this strangely when they’d had to act affectionately towards each other in the past, like when they’d announced their engagement to Alex’s friends for example. He normally exuded a confident and personable aura. He was lacking that lately. So his explanation made sense, but it still didn’t feel like the whole truth. He still felt like he was missing something.

“Well, alright. As long as we’re working on it,” Alex replied.

“We’re working on it,” Thomas said stiffly, but then he turned on the car radio, clearly signalling the end of the conversation.

~

Thomas knew he was acting strangely. He’d been trying to keep the inner turmoil about what he’d overheard Washington say to a minimum, but he knew it wasn’t working. Alex was picking up on how weird he was being. 

It would have been so easy to just tell Alex everything right when he heard it, would’ve been so easy to just break everything off then and there. But he hadn’t. He hadn’t been able to bring himself to, despite everything.

Thomas had gone right to sleep when they’d arrived back at his place, since they’d arrived pretty late and they had work in the morning. Interaction had been kept to a minimum. They’d both headed off to their separate rooms. And when morning came, they easily fell into their previous routine of quietly drinking more coffee than was probably healthy and then heading to work.

At work, Thomas couldn’t help but notice that his workload had been lessened once again. He was back to being the equivalent of a human spell checker, back to having no influence again. He didn’t mention this to Alex.

When lunchtime came around, this time Thomas was the one to take the initiative and seek out James. He knew he’d been neglecting their friendship as of late, as a result of his previously heavy workload as well as impending marriage keeping him busy. But now that neither of those things were exactly taking up a significant portion of his schedule, Thomas was determined to make up for it.

He knocked on James’ office door, opening it and presenting the bag of takeout he was holding when James called for him to come in. “I got us lunch from Dolley’s, if you’re not busy,” he told him, smiling tentatively. He’d stopped there on the way to work, leaving Alex sitting impatiently in the passenger seat while he went inside to pick it up.

“I’m not busy,” James told him, returning the smile briefly as he set aside his laptop to give his full attention to Thomas.

“I’m sorry I’ve been such a bad friend lately,” he told him, setting the bag of food down on the desk and sitting across from.

“You haven’t been a bad friend. You’ve just had a lot on your plate,” James told him, digging a pastry out of the bag. The ‘lunch’ was actually just a bag of various pastries, but they both had a sweet tooth, so he didn’t think James would mind. He was pretty sure James was just being too forgiving when he said that and didn’t completely mean it. In his mind, it was an inarguable fact that he’d been a bad friend.

“Well, I’m sorry anyway. I’ve missed you,” Thomas said honestly, grabbing a pastry for himself.

“I’ve missed you too,” James said, expression softening slightly, “And you’ve missed a lot.”

“I have? Like what?” Whatever he’d missed had to be something good if the way James was failing to suppress a small but genuine grin was anything to go by.

“Well, Aaron and I are together, for one,” he told him, his grin bursting out at it’s full magnitude. Thomas couldn’t help but smile back, happy that his friend was happy.

“You are? For how long?” Thomas felt horrible that he had been too absorbed in himself and his own problems lately to notice a development like this, but he was nonetheless happy for him.

“It’s still really new, less than a week at this point, but.. I really like him, Thomas,” James just sounded content. It was good to hear.

“I’m glad,” Thomas told him sincerely.

There was a moment of silence before James asked, “So, how are things with you and Alexander?”

“There isn’t exactly a ‘me and Alex’,” Thomas replied, sounding inexplicably bitter. James just raised an eyebrow and Thomas sighed before continuing, “Things have been weird.”

“Weird like how?” James asked curiously.

“Weird like I overheard Washington say he doesn’t trust me and doesn’t plan to give me the cabinet position. The position that was the whole reason for me agreeing to this scheme. Weird like I’ve just been going along with things without telling Alex, and I know he knows something’s up, but he hasn’t asked me directly and I haven’t told him,” Thomas blurted out. 

“Thomas, that’s-”

“Crazy? I know!” Thomas was feeling slightly hysterical at this point.

“I was just gonna say- do you plan on ever telling him?” James asked, oddly calm.

“I don’t know. I mean, I know I should. But- I don’t know why, but I don’t want to. I can’t make myself,” Thomas told him.

“Why don’t you want to?”

“I don’t know!” Thomas could come up with no reasonable explanations as to why he was so against bringing this up to Alex. At this point it was just weird that he had waited so long.

“Thomas, this isn’t sustainable. What are you going to do if Washington gets elected? He won’t give you the post. You won’t be able to go on like everything’s normal then, will you?”

“No, obviously I won’t, James. I’m just.. gonna need more time to figure things out, alright?” James merely nodded in response, which Thomas was extremely grateful for.

“Hey, would you mind if I told Aaron about all this? You don’t have to say yes, I just think it would be easier if I could talk about it with him rather than having to talk around it,” James asked him.

Thomas nodded, hardly giving it a second thought. Which maybe wasn’t the smartest or most cautious course of action, but he trusted James, “If you trust him, I trust your judgement.”

“Thanks,” James said, then he smiled and brought up some gossip he heard from Burr about one of their coworkers, and just like that, their friendship fell back into its natural rhythm. 

~

James couldn’t help but grin when Aaron opened the door to let him in. He found that he was smiling a lot more often and more sincerely than usual lately.

They’d agreed to meet at his apartment for a dinner date of sorts, though James also had the agenda of bringing up what he knew about Thomas and Hamilton. He had a theory and he wanted to know if it also made sense to someone who was less directly involved in the situation.

Aaron smiled back and invited him inside. 

The dinner was nice, both the food itself and the company, something he was sure to tell Aaron. He wasn’t in any rush to bring up Thomas, unsure if that would be an awkward subject between them. But eventually, he figured there had never been any communication issues between them, so what was the worst that could happen?

“So, I’ve got something to tell you about Thomas and Hamilton. Something you can’t tell anyone else,” James said, tone pointedly light and conversational.

“And what’s that?” Aaron asked, putting down his fork to give James his full attention.

“Their marriage is a sham. It’s been a sham this whole time to get Hamilton his citizenship in time for him to get a cabinet position,” James explained.

“And Thomas agreed to this?” Aaron’s eyes had understandably widened in shock.

“Hamilton is supposed to be helping him secure a cabinet position,” James replied. Aaron’s expression had gone more calculating now, which James wasn’t quite sure what to make of. 

“Who else knows about this?” Aaron asked.

“Just me, you, and the two of them. But I wanted to tell you because I have a theory and I need an outside party to tell me if I sound crazy,” James told him.

“This whole thing sounds crazy. But what’s your theory?” Aaron seemed to have gotten over the shock awfully quickly and still seemed more calculating than anything. But James just put it down to him not being one to be particularly expressive.

“Well, first off, this whole thing has backfired for Thomas completely. Washington trusts him less than ever and just thinks he’s taking advantage of Hamilton. He’s already made up his mind not to give Thomas a cabinet position. The thing is, Thomas knows all this, but he won’t tell Hamilton,” James explained.

“So Thomas has no reason to stay married to Alexander?”

“No reason at all. Unless…”

“Unless he just wants to help him out,” Aaron said, though he sounded disbelieving of that idea.

“But why would he want to do that? He hated him not too long ago,” James pointed out.

“Unless he didn’t. He has to like him at least in some capacity to go through with this when it’s actively hurting his career. Do you think there’s something romantic there? At least on Thomas’ side?” Aaron replied.

“That was my theory,” James stated simply.

“Well, it doesn’t sound crazy. It makes sense in a weird way,” Aaron said, the calculating expression still on his face. James figured he was still trying to think all this through.

“That’s what I was thinking. Should we do something?”

“Do something?” Aaron echoed, raising an eyebrow as if he’d never even considered getting involved.

“Well, yeah. Thomas is going to go down for this if something doesn’t change,” James said pointedly.

“I’m not sure there’s anything either of us can do,” Aaron shrugged, “Thomas needs to either pull out of this agreement or own up to wanting to help Alexander just for the sake of helping him.”

“He doesn’t want to do either of those things,” James protested.

“Of course he doesn’t. But those are his options,” Aaron said matter of factly.

There was silence for a moment while James thought that through. Eventually he changed the topic to a project he was dealing with at work, something Aaron went along with readily.

But what stuck with James was how quickly Aaron’s expression had shifted from surprised to calculating. He didn’t want to regret telling him or be suspicious of him because of something as small as an odd facial expression, but he had a nervous feeling about it that he couldn’t shake. But he was probably just being paranoid.

~

“You told James he could what?” Alex said sharply, slamming his laptop shut. Thomas was just sitting on the couch with a book on his lap as if he saw no issue with what he’d just said.

“So that’s what it takes to get you to stop working,” Thomas said, a trace of amusement in his voice. Alex had noticed that Thomas spent less time working ever since they got back from the wedding, but he couldn’t think why. Washington had said he was going to up Thomas’ workload, so it couldn’t be that he didn’t have work to do. Maybe he was just being lazy, or he was a much more efficient worker than Alex had thought.

Anyway, that wasn’t what mattered. The fact was, Thomas had outright betrayed his trust. “This isn’t funny, Jefferson. I didn’t want anyone to know about this! I could understand you not wanting to keep secrets from James, but I absolutely draw the line at Burr! He’s a slimy bastard, there’s no way he’s not going to use it against me, Jefferson, what the hell have you done?”

“James trusts him. And I trust James,” Thomas said quietly. He did at least seem somewhat ashamed, but he was still sticking to his position.

“Then James is an idiot, and so are you. Did you not think I should at least be a part of the conversation? If this gets out, I’ll be ruined! And you’ll be ruined, too! Did you not think of that? We’re both ruined!” 

“You’re overreacting, Burr won’t tell anyone,” Thomas shot back, but he was seeming less sure of himself by the minute.

“You’re underreacting! You can’t know that. I didn’t even tell John. My own best friend doesn’t even know about this. You want to know why? Because I was trying to keep this contained! Meanwhile, you get to have this whole support system of people- which puts us at risk, by the way! And what do I get? I get to be paranoid and constantly worried about this getting out,” Alex hadn’t exactly meant to say that much, but his mouth did have a way of getting ahead of him sometimes.

There was a silence before Thomas spoke up again, “I shouldn’t have given James permission to tell him without talking to you first.”

“No you shouldn’t have,” Alex shot back immediately, “And for the record, if you’d asked, I would’ve said no.”

“I’m sorry,” Thomas said, sounding actually genuine. It was odd to hear to say the least, and Alex deflated slightly, not seeing the need to keep berating him if he was giving in.

“You should be,” Alex grumbled, opening up his laptop and continuing to type like nothing happened, aside from the glowering expression on his face. It wasn’t forgiveness, but it was the closest thing to it Thomas was likely to get from him anytime soon.


	10. Direct and decisive action

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The formatting is accidentally different? Idk if it's better or worse and I'm also not entirely sure how it happened so.. that's awkward. Also hopefully this update coming a little earlier than usual will make up for the last one being hella late? Hopefully

Thomas was still acting strangely, but at this point, Alex was over it. Thomas was a grown adult, if he wasn’t going to admit to Alex that there was something the matter, then nothing was the matter. He had more pressing matters to focus on.

Pressing matters like getting his green card application in motion as quickly as possible. The average waiting time to get a marriage based green card was often a year or even more. It was mid-July now and he only had until early November at the absolute latest to get this done. Things were looking pretty grim.

But he couldn’t think about that too much. Maybe he could pull some strings to get his application processed more quickly. ‘Maybe’ wasn’t enough of a guarantee in the least, but he couldn’t focus on that yet. For now, he had to focus on filling out forms, compiling documents, and getting himself and Thomas prepared for their interview. The rest could come later.

The both of them would have to file a form. Thomas, to prove his own citizenship as well as the validity of their marriage, and Alex to prove his health and eligibility for a green card. Technically, Thomas should be filling out his own form, but Alex had opted to do it himself. He was currently sitting in his office at work, filling in everything he knew definitively. Once he was finished with what he could do on his own, he’d ask Thomas for information he’d missed plus the necessary supplementary documents.

Necessary as getting this work done was, he was also somewhat using it as an excuse to put off dealing with other issues. Thomas was acting weird, but so was Alex, even if his behavior was a direct result of Thomas’.

Mostly, he was just irrationally angry. Not at Thomas directly- well a little at Thomas directly, after the stunt he’d pulled in letting Madison tell Burr. But truthfully he was just upset in general. Thomas had seemed so genuine, like he’d really meant it when he told Alex they should try being friends. Alex had been somewhat hopeful that this whole situation might not turn out to be as much of a disaster as it seemed, if him and Thomas became friends as a result of it. But Thomas had just immediately pulled away again after their conversation, as if it had never happened. He shouldn’t be this upset, it shouldn’t bother him this much. But nonetheless, it really really did.

But Alex thrived under pressure, he knew he did. And if the need to get his green card approved didn’t cause extreme pressure, he didn’t know what did. 

Plus, it had the added benefit of making it so he didn’t have to think about Thomas as much, besides in the sense that he was filling out forms that involved him. He could think about the facts he was writing down on these forms rather than Thomas’ changes in demeanor. He could worry about whether or not the card would be approved on time rather than wonder if these changes meant Thomas was going to pull out of their deal.

Everything was uncertain, and Alexander didn’t like uncertainty. He couldn’t focus on what he couldn’t change. All he could do was have tunnel vision on what he actually did have the power to do.

~

Thomas had come to a decision. Was it a stupid decision? Yes, probably. Was he going to have a hard time explaining this to Alex? One hundred percent. Were there other options? Yes, there most likely.

But as far as he could see, none of these other options were good options. If he stayed with Alex and didn’t do anything, nothing would change and Washington would still mistrust him. If he didn’t stay with him, Washington would see straight through to his intentions and know he’d done all of this for the career opportunities. There were no good options to salvage his reputation in Washington’s eyes. It was already ruined.

But if he resigned… well. Washington couldn’t exactly accuse him of using Alex to get to him if Thomas didn’t even work with them anymore. Would that be enough to get Washington to trust him enough to give him a cabinet position? Probably not. Washington hadn’t liked him much in the first place. Plus he might suspect that Thomas was doing all of this just to get Washington to trust him. So Thomas’ political career was dead, at least as it related to Washington. 

No matter what happened, Thomas was going to get the short end of the stick. But he figured just because one of them had to suffer didn’t mean they both had to. Nothing Thomas did was going to make any positive difference for himself or his career. But if he resigned, people would probably question their marriage less since there was less opportunity for him to potentially take advantage of Alex. And at least Thomas wouldn’t have to keep suffering through having a workplace with such a negative energy towards him.

Besides, this was just a setback. Sure, it was a pretty major one, but it didn’t necessarily have to mean the end for him. He could get work as a lawyer pretty easily for a while. Then he could run for Senate or something like that when the next election came around. It wasn’t the end of the world.

So, having completely justified his decision to himself, he picked up the resignation letter he’d written, deciding to hand deliver it to Washington so he could see his reaction firsthand.

The thought that he should probably tell Alex or at least James about this crossed his mind, not for the first time. But they’d probably just think it was a rash decision, and he didn’t want to be talked out of it.

No one gave him a second look as he carried the letter down the hallway. It wasn’t exactly unusual for an employee to be delivering some paper or other somewhere.

He knocked on Washington’s door promptly when he arrived, not wanting to give himself the time to get psyched out. He was putting active effort into appearing more collected than he felt.

He entered promptly when he heard Washington call out to do so.

“Mr. Jefferson,” Washington said, expression growing visibly colder upon the sight of him. Thomas just nodded in greeting, determined not to let it get to him. Instead of putting it off any longer, Thomas dropped the letter on his desk.

“What’s this?” Washington asked, seeming suspicious.

“My two weeks notice, sir. I’m resigning,” Thomas told him, not bothering to beat around the bush. There was a heavy silence as Washington seemed to take this in.

“Why?” he asked simply.

“Alexander is a shoe in for a cabinet position. I know you haven’t said anything about it, but honestly, you haven’t needed to. Everyone knows he deserves a position,” Washington seemed even more suspicious at the mere mention of cabinet positions, so Thomas rushed to continue, “I’m getting in the way. Everyone’s suspicious of me. I don’t want to become a scandal for him, so I’m taking myself out of the equation completely.”

The way he’d phrased it made it seem like what Thomas was doing was much more self sacrificing than it actually was. In reality, he’d just given up on trying to salvage his professional relationship with Washington and saw no reason to drag Alex down with him. 

“What will you do instead?” Washington asked.

“I’ll follow Alex to DC and find a job as a lawyer. Maybe I’ll run for congress in the next election cycle, I haven’t decided yet,” Thomas said, being completely honest about his plans. Luckily, Washington seemed to cool down when he saw that Thomas seemed serious about dropping any ambitions of going to the White House with him.

“You’re serious about this?” Washington questioned.

“As serious as it gets,” Thomas replied, gesturing at the resignation letter for emphasis.

“Alright then,” Washington said, leaning back in his chair and picking up the letter. He started reading it and nodded, apparently satisfied.

Thomas sat there for another few seconds before he realized that was the closest thing to a dismissal he was going to get. He gave Washington an awkward nod before getting up and leaving.

Now he just had to bring this up to Alexander somehow.

~

James had been spending the majority of his free time with Aaron these days. He’d also been eating lunch with and seeing Thomas outside of work regularly again. Their friendship had fallen effortlessly back into it’s usual flow and he knew exactly where he stood with him now. Oddly enough, becoming close with him again didn’t make his previous feelings for him flare up. He just felt secure in their friendship and secure in his relationship with Aaron. It had been a while since he’d felt so secure.

He felt secure now, leaning on Aaron on his couch while they half paid attention to a movie that was on in the background, holding Aaron’s hand in his lap.

He felt less secure with the troubled look in Aaron’s eyes. It wasn’t obvious at all, Aaron was adept at using his facial expressions to mask emotions, but to James who knew him well, it was visible.

“Are you alright?” James asked, leaning slightly away from him and turning his head to look at him more fully. Aaron squeezed his hand briefly in response.

“I’m just being irrational, it’s not important,” Aaron replied. James appreciated that he at least hadn't tried to lie about something being wrong.

“If it’s bothering you, it’s important to me. You don’t have to tell me, but maybe I could help if you did?” James now squeezed Aaron’s hand in return.

“I doubt that,” Aaron said, but then he sighed and continued, “It’s just- you know how it’s becoming more and more obvious that Alexander’s gunning for a cabinet position? And succeeding?”

James just nodded.

“Well, I’ve been gunning for it too,” James’ eyebrows raised in surprise. He hadn’t even known Aaron was interested in a position. Although he supposed it made sense that he would be.

“Well there are lots of available positions. You might get one,” James pointed out. Because it was true, he might, Washington did have a lot of spots to fill.

“But more likely I won’t. Or I’ll get a low level one. You can’t deny Washington doesn’t pay as much attention to me as he does to Alexander. He doesn’t pay anyone half as much attention as he pays Alexander,” James spent a second scrambling for words, not quite knowing how to respond to that.

“See, I told you it was stupid. I just sound jealous,” Aaron cut in before James could formulate a sentence. James didn’t deny it. He did sound jealous, even if James wouldn’t outright say it.

“Maybe you just need to put yourself out there more,” James suggested tentatively. He knew Aaron tended to be overly cautious, but he didn’t want to push too hard in case it was a sore spot for him.

Aaron shook his head, “I can’t be too abrasive, that would be worse.”

James sighed before replying, “Look, you’re smart. You’re capable. You would thrive in Washington’s cabinet. The only thing holding you back is how overcautious you can be.”

“I don’t know,” Aaron said uncertainly. 

“You want Washington to pay attention to you like he does Alexander?” James asked. Aaron simply nodded, “Well, what does Alexander do to get Washington’s attention? He goes for what he wants. He takes direct and decisive action.”

There was silence for a moment.

“So, you’re saying if I want a cabinet position, I should take direct and decisive action?” he asked, contemplatively.

“That’s what I’m saying,” James agreed, nodding encouragingly. Aaron looked at him for a second, his face taking on the calculating expression that had become pretty common lately.

“Thank you, James,” he said eventually, leaning over to press a kiss to his forehead.

James beamed at him before moving to lean against him once more, turning his attention back to the movie playing, satisfied that talking it out had seemed to help Aaron.

~

Thomas wasn’t quite sure what to do with himself when he got home from work that day. He had been planning to clue Alex in on the events of the day on the car ride back, simply because that was the soonest he’d be alone with him, and the longer he went without telling him the more likely he was to just not say anything until he was actively not working for Washington anymore. But Alex had told him he was going to be home late and not to bother waiting for home, he’d use public transportation.

Eventually, he decided to start making dinner for the two of them. It had been a while since he’d done that, having mostly stopped after their honeymoon. But it would give him something to keep him busy, plus he’d noticed their conversations seemed to be calmer overall when they were over dinner.

Alex ended up arriving home when he was about halfway finished cooking, wandering into the kitchen after having followed the smell. “What’s the occasion?” he asked, seeing Thomas cooking.

“No occasion. Just thought I’d cook something,” Thomas replied.

“Alright,” Alex breezed past the moment easily, “I was going through the forms for the green card application, and I made a list of doc-”

“Can this wait ten minutes? I’m a little busy,” Thomas asked, attempting to postpone the rant until he could at least give it his attention.

Alexander huffed but conceded and meandered his way into the dining room, where he instantly pulled out his laptop and was lost to the world.

Thomas took the opportunity to finish cooking and give the kitchen a little wipe down before bringing the food over to where Alex was sitting.

“Smells good,” Alex commented, half paying attention, still on his laptop,

“So eat some,” Thomas said, amused, sitting down across from Alex and grabbing some for himself.

“Right,” Alex agreed, staring at the laptop for another moment before eventually shutting it and setting it aside in order to eat.

“We should talk,” Thomas stated. Alex just nodded, completely unsurprised and unphased by this statement, contrary to Thomas’ expectations.

“We should. So I’ve made a list I’ve documents I’ll need you to get- birth certificate, bank records- oh yeah, can you put my name on your bank account so it looks like we share finances?” Oh, so Alex had just thought he meant they should talk about green card issues. 

The silence must have gone a second too long because Alex added, tone prompting, “I won’t actually do anything with it.”

“Right, sure, I’ll do that,” Thomas replied, snapping out of his daze.

Alex was apparently unphased by this, just continuing, “So I just need those things, and some information I need for the form. Actually, you should probably put my name on the lease too. And we should probably print up some wedding photos, apparently we might need-”

“Alex,” Thomas interrupted. The ranting didn’t seem like it was going to end anytime soon on it’s own, so Thomas took it upon himself to cut it short.

“Hm?”

“I quit my job,” he said, rather bluntly, figuring he might as well start this story like he was ripping off a bandaid. He still wasn’t quite sure how he was going to explain this. Most likely he’d just have to make something up on the fly.

“What? You-why?” Alex stammered, apparently unable to get much more out, having visibly paled at Thomas’ words. He’d obviously assumed the worst, that this was the prelude to Thomas pulling out of the agreement.

“Washington’s not giving me a cabinet position no matter what I do. He’s going to drop me as soon as he’s elected because he doesn’t trust me and there’s no way to make him. Continuing working for him is only going to hurt my career,” Thomas explained.

“But- what am I supposed to do?” Alex asked, tone turning desperate.

“Relax, we can still stay married. I plan on seeing this through,” Thomas assured him, although Alex didn’t look very reassured.

“Why?” he asked suspiciously.

“Maybe he’ll trust me more when he thinks I’m not just with you for the job opportunities,” Thomas said half-heartedly. He knew it was stupid. If he didn’t work for Washington and was barely established in whatever job he got next, he wouldn’t be chosen for the cabinet. Besides, Washington would never fall for a move like that.

“You’re crazy if you think a plan this terrible will get you into the cabinet,” Alex said bluntly. Thomas knew, and he didn’t think it would.

“It might,” he said, not bothering to provide an actual argument. He held eye contact with a pointed look, trying to get Alex to drop it.

Thomas knew it wouldn’t work. Alex knew it wouldn’t work. Alex probably knew that Thomas knew it wouldn’t work. This situation was extremely unstable. If Alex questioned things too much, Thomas would be forced to admit he had no answers, and then he would have to back out.

Miraculously, Alex seemed to get the point, breaking eye contact and just huffing to himself.

“Your food’s getting cold,” Thomas said awkwardly, and Alex shot him a little glare before stabbing his plate with aggression.


	11. I'll go clear my desk

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The format is gonna be like this permanently, I've decided
> 
> I got nothing aside from that except enjoy!

There was no way Thomas was stupid enough to think this plan would get him into the cabinet. He was completely taking himself out of the picture, most likely getting himself a job out of politics where Washington could feel safe in putting him out of his mind. There was no way that would have a positive effect on his career. If anything, it would stop it right in its tracks by making him forgettable. 

Thomas was a lot of things, but stupid wasn’t one of them. Alex genuinely didn’t believe Thomas thought his plan was a good one.

So then why would he decide to go on with this? Alex couldn’t think of a single way continuing to help Alex would benefit Thomas at all. 

They’d spent a week in this precarious way. They’d needed to spend a lot more time together as the date of their interview approached quickly. They would need to ace it and convince the interviewer that they were a legitimate couple or else Alex’s green card application would be denied. They’d quizzed each other on basic facts about each other- Alex never in his life thought he’d end up knowing this many fun facts about Thomas Jefferson of all people. At this point he could even list almost each and every Jefferson as well as their ages, careers, and husbands and wives. And there were a lot of Jeffersons. They’d also printed out their wedding pictures as well as taken a few more supplementary photos to bring to the interview.

In all the time they spent together, Thomas’ motivations for staying with him were never discussed, but Alex had a feeling it was on both of their minds. He knew for sure it was on his own mind. There were a few times he thought it might be about to come up. He’d give Thomas an analyzing look as he tried to puzzle it out, and Thomas would look at him warningly, poorly hidden anxiety in his eyes. Alex wasn’t known to be the type to be exactly delicate with people. With Thomas in particular, he was sometimes exceedingly blunt, especially before this whole arrangement started. Normally, just someone looking at him funny wouldn’t be enough to make him stop pressing an issue, especially if that issue involved him personally. But something in Thomas’ expression held him back from the all out interrogation he was itching for. Something in it said this was something Alex didn’t want to push. So Alex didn’t push.

Of course, that didn’t mean he wasn’t frustrated about it. He was extremely frustrated. He hated not knowing things.

Still, he didn’t have the time to dedicate to this puzzle. Especially now that the week leading up to the interview had passed and they actually had to survive it.

They were in the car now, Thomas driving them while Alex fidgeted anxiously in the passenger seat.

“Tell our proposal story again,” Alex demanded. He’d been quizzing Thomas relentlessly, wanting to be sure there was no room for a slip up.

“Alex, we’ve been going over the details for the past week, we know everything we need to know to pass as a couple,” Thomas said reassuringly. Alex knew he was beginning to be irritated by the sheer amount Alex had been quizzing him and drilling facts into the both of their heads. But Alex just wanted to make sure nothing went wrong.

“If you mess something up because you wouldn’t let me quiz you, I swear-”

“I won’t,” Thomas interrupted, a lot of the patience going out of his voice.

Alex just huffed and started verbally laying out the timeline of their supposed relationship. At least Thomas appeared to be listening to him as he drove, so it could serve as a refresher for the both of them.

Alex’s anxiety only grew as they got closer and closer to the embassy. Luckily it wasn’t incredibly far from Thomas’ home, so he didn’t have a long car ride to get worked up during.

When Thomas eventually pulled into a parking spot, Alex didn’t move to get out, just sitting there and taking a deep breath. If this didn’t go well, everything was over, this was all for nothing. He didn’t even want to think about the consequences if he wasn’t able to get his hands on a green card.

He looked up sharply when he felt Thomas’ hand on his shoulder.

“We’ve spent the last week preparing for this interview, and even before that, we’ve gotten to know a lot about each other. Besides, the interviewer will want to help, it’s not like they’ll be out to get you. You’ve done plenty of things more difficult than this. You’ll be fine. You’ve got this, easy,” Thomas’ voice had gone back to being calm and reassuring, his patience evidently having returned. Alex focused on his voice as he listened.

Alex took another deep breath and nodded, calming down and determinedly getting into his ‘getting things done’ mindset, echoing Thomas’ statement, “I’ll be fine. I’ve got this.”

Thomas gave a firm nod, squeezing his shoulder lightly as he did. That motion seemed to remind him that he was still touching him, and he pulled his hand away, maybe a little too quickly. Alex almost missed the touch, not that he was going to allow himself to fixate on that thought. He couldn’t lose focus.

“Okay,” Alex said to himself, turning and climbing out of the car.

Thomas got out of the other side and the two of them met in front of the car. Alex grabbed his hand determinedly, as had been previously agreed, and the two of them made their way into the embassy.

~

Aaron sat alone in his office, laptop open so it would look like he was working if anyone happened in on him. In reality, he was lost in his thoughts regarding what he’d learned from James. 

On one hand, he was sitting on some extremely sensitive information. Extremely sensitive information that could hurt the political career of his biggest competitor. If anyone found out about this, there was no way Washington could let Alexander have a cabinet position. It would be a huge scandal. And if Alexander couldn’t have the position, Washington would have to look elsewhere to fill it. He might look to Aaron. Everyone had said, hell even James agreed, that the reason he didn’t succeed was that he was always waiting around for the right time, never taking action when he needed to. Maybe now was the time for him to take action for once.

On the other hand, he knew for a fact this was not what James had thought he’d meant by taking action. James probably just thought he was going to step up his game at work and speak to Washington about his interest in a position. James had trusted Aaron with this information, had trusted that he wouldn’t do anything with it. And Aaron was considering doing something as drastic as taking it to the public? James would never forgive him.

Then again, he could always do it anonymously. James would never even have to know it was him and everything could stay the same between them.

But could Aaron really live with himself if he did that?

Bringing this scandal to light wouldn’t just hurt Alexander. It would ruin Thomas’ reputation as well, and if it ever got out that James had been in on this, his too. Even if he did it anonymously, therefore saving himself from James’ hatred, he would have more than enough hatred for himself to make up for it.

Maybe there was a middle ground of some sort? He didn’t want to actually permanently hurt anyone’s careers, especially not those of the people he was close to. 

Maybe if he went directly to Washington instead of involving the media, Washington would see Alexander as too risky to associate with politically. He knew Washington wouldn’t spread the information anywhere, no one else would find out about it from him. Nobody’s careers would be permanently damaged and a spot in the cabinet would be opened up. He could see no downsides to this option.

Mind made up, he decided to tell Washington right away. Direct action and all that. He walked to Washington’s office quickly, wasting no time in knocking politely at the door. 

When he was told to come in, he did so, a polite smile on his face.

“Burr, can I help you?” Washington asked, tone clipped, clearly busy whatever he was typing on his laptop. But Aaron wasn’t concerned about that, he knew Washington would want to hear what he had to say, at least on this topic.

“I’ve recently acquired some information,” Aaron said carefully.

“What is it?” Washington asked, sounding no less annoyed.

“About Alexander and Thomas’ marriage,” he added, watching Washington’s face closely. That got his interest peaked, he could tell. Washington’s eyebrows furrowed and he looked even more impatient. He stared at Aaron without speaking, obviously waiting for him to continue.

“It’s fake,” he stated simply, watching Washington’s expression go momentarily slack with shock before he got himself back under control and it returned to a stern neutral, “Alexander convinced Thomas to marry him to solve an issue he has with his green card, and Thomas was supposed to get a cabinet position, or at the very least your trust, out of it.”

“Thank you for telling me,” Washington said, after a momentary silence. His words and tone were polite, but he was staring at Aaron with a look of poorly hidden disdain. Maybe he was just upset with the situation and it only seemed like it was directed at Aaron?

But Aaron’s gut told him otherwise. 

“Of course, sir,” he felt his stomach drop, paling as Washington’s expression didn’t let up in the slightest. Aaron had the sinking feeling that Washington had seen straight through to his motivations and that this was about to backfire in a spectacular way. If Washington had even the slightest suspicion that he was selling Alexander out for his own benefit, he’d be done for. He had been hoping that Washington would be too focused on the situation itself to ponder Aaron’s involvement too much. But based on his expression, this gamble had not worked out to his benefit. 

This was the exact reason he never took risks. They never seemed to work out for him. 

“Go tell Alexander and Thomas I’d like to see them in my office as soon as is convenient,” Washington ordered simply, face going neutral again as his thoughts evidently turned away from Aaron for the time being.

Aaron wordlessly rushed out. He knew where he wasn’t welcome.

~

Thomas and Alex arrived late to work, having been held up by the interview. They had gotten an appointment as early in the morning as possible in the hopes that their lateness wouldn’t be too noticeable. They were late by an hour at most, but neither of the two of them were exactly known for being late at all, least of all Alex. It was going to be difficult to explain without being suspicious.

At least the interview seemed to have gone well. Thomas had watched Alex go from anxious and irritable to charming and convincing as soon as they walked through the doors of the embassy. He’d appeared completely in his element during the interview, and of course Thomas turned on the charm as well, so the interviewer had seemed to eat up everything they said.

Thomas was in a good mood after their success, but Alex had gone straight back to being anxious, immediately fixating on what his next move was going to be. He’d filed the paperwork and they’d done the interview, so as far as Thomas knew, all that was left was the waiting. Though if he knew Alex at all, he’d be trying to find a way to speed even that part up.

When they walked into the office building together, Thomas was immediately met with the sight of Burr pacing back and forth in front of the entrance. He stopped instantly, whipping around to face them when the door opened. His face was pale, and he looked like he’d seen a ghost.

“What’s the matter with you?” Alex asked, looking suspicious at Burr’s demeanor.

“You’re late,” Burr blurted.

“We are,” Thomas agreed, raising his eyebrows. He didn’t see how that would affect Burr.

“Washington wants to see you. Um, both of you,” for someone who usually seemed so neutral and calm, he was awfully guilty looking.

Thomas felt a knot of anxiety tighten in his stomach. There weren’t many things this could be about, and there was the fact that Burr had recently found out their secret combined with how guilty he looked and the fact that Washington now wanted to speak to them. He had the feeling he knew what this was about.

Alex’s expression of suspicion only darkened. He looked like he was warring between panic, suspicion, and rage. It seemed like rage was winning out, as he snapped at Burr, “If this is what I think it is, you’re dead.” He then shot both Burr and Thomas a glare, stalking away in the direction of Washington’s office. All Thomas could do was follow.

Thomas trailed along behind Alex as he pushed open Washington’s office door, not even bothering to knock.

“You asked for us, sir?”

“I did,” Washington replied, his calm demeanor a stark contrast to how on edge Alex was. Washington gestured for the both of them to sit. Alex took the chair in front of Washington's desk, so Thomas was forced to pull one over from the corner of the room.

“Would you like to explain what I heard about your marriage being some sort of scheme having to do with your green card?” Washington asked. The question wasn’t directed at Thomas, so he just sat quietly, wishing he were anywhere else in the world.

“Did Burr tell you?” Alex demanded, ignoring Washington’s question.

Washington sighed, “He did, but-”

“That slimy bastard!” he whipped his head around to stare accusingly at Thomas, who cringed at having his anger directed at him. “What did I fucking tell you? You shouldn’t have-”

“Alexander!” luckily, Washington’s firm reprimand drew the attention away from Thomas for the time being. 

“I just wish you would have told me. We could have figured something out rather than you having to go to such lengths,” Washington waved a dismissive hand at Thomas. He tried not to let it sting too much.

“I’m sorry, sir,” Alex said, dropping his gaze, actually seeming ashamed, “But I really did research it thoroughly. This was the best option.”

Washington just sighed again, “It’s alright, son.” Alex’s face hardened at the use of the word ‘son’, but he didn’t speak up about it for once. “So you’re getting a green card? How far along in the process are you, and what’s the rest of your plan?” 

“All the paperwork is filed and we just completed the interview. I’m just waiting now, though I’m hoping to find a way to rush the process so I’ll have the green card by the election,” Alex explained.

“I’ll call in some favors, you’ll have it by the election,” Washington promised.

“Thank you, sir,” Alex replied, seeming extremely relieved. All things considered, this conversation was going a lot better than Thomas had expected.

“Now, Mr. Jefferson,” Thomas swallowed hard, his anxiety increasing tenfold as he was addressed directly, “I’ve heard some interesting things about your motivations for being a part of this.” His voice was cold.

Alex interrupted before Thomas could think of anything to say in response, “Sir, his motivations are hardly something to be angry about.”

“Really? Because it seems to me that he was taking advantage of your time of need for his own benefit,” Washington argued.

“Well, I couldn’t very well ask him to do it for nothing, could I?” Alex was getting angry again. Normally, Thomas didn’t like others fighting his battles, but he was appreciative of Alex’s retorts at the moment considering how tongue tied he’d been. 

“Then you should’ve asked someone you could, someone you could trust,” Washington replied stubbornly.

Alex huffed before responding, “I’d say he’s more trustworthy than you think considering he hasn’t been getting anything out of this for quite some time now.”

“What do you mean?” Washington asked.

“I mean he found out you weren’t going to give him a cabinet position, and here we are, not divorced,” Alex snapped. Thomas had hoped he wouldn’t say something about that. Now that it had been acknowledged out loud, they were probably going to have to actually talk about it.

Washington seemed to process that for a moment before turning to Thomas again, “You’re aware that this isn’t going to benefit your career in the least.”

“I’m aware,” Thomas confirmed.

“And you plan to stay married to Alex as long as necessary?”

“Yes,” Thomas replied, now knowing for sure there was going to be no way he was going to get out of Alex interrogating him about this later.

“Alright,” Washington at least seemed much less angry with him now, which Thomas was grateful for, “I know you’re not scheduled to stop working here until next week, but perhaps it would be better if you left today instead. You can email me if you need a recommendation letter, but aside from that, this is where our professional relationship ends.”

“Sir!” Alex immediately jumped in to protest, but Washington raised a hand to silence him.

“It’s fine, Alex,” frankly, Thomas had no issues leaving this work environment with all speed. He wasn’t exactly a fan of how Washington viewed him.

“I’ll go clear my desk. Alex, will you need a ride home?’

When Alex shook his head no, Thomas just nodded and got up and left, not bothering to wait to be dismissed. 

~

Alex had had plenty of time after Thomas left to get his thoughts together, and by the time he arrived home (by public transport since he’d told Thomas he didn’t need a ride), he had them pretty well in order.

Firstly and most obviously, he was furious with Burr. He didn’t know what he was going to do about it yet exactly, but he did know that he was going to make sure he didn’t get away with this. He was also still a bit upset with Thomas and Madison about the fact that Burr had ever even found out in the first place, but them he was much more willing to forgive. 

Secondly, and more surprisingly, he found himself annoyed with Washington. It had always bothered him a little when people thought of him as Washington’s favorite because it tended to mean they attributed his successes to his Washington’s favor. But it had never before bothered him to have Washington favor him over Thomas specifically, probably because of their rivalry. Why then did it bother him so much when Washington was supportive and sympathetic towards him, yet nothing but cold towards Thomas?

Thirdly, he was done putting up with not knowing whatever it was that was holding Thomas in this arrangement. It made no sense for them to stay married when all it was doing was holding Thomas back. Now that his green card was all but guaranteed after Washington’s promise, he was done letting Thomas sweep whatever it was under the rug. He was going to find out.

That decided, he opened the door to Thomas’ penthouse, immediately looking around for Thomas. He found him in the living room, sitting on the couch with a book open on his lap, though he didn’t look much like he was focused on reading it. Considering the events of the day, he looked a lot calmer than Alex had expected. 

“Alex,” Thomas said in greeting, looking up when he heard him walk in.

“Hey,” Alex said, walking over to sit beside him, Thomas putting aside the book as he did so.

“How was work?” Thomas asked, apparently trying to start a normal conversation.

“Fine,” Alex said simply, not going along with the direction Thomas was trying to push the conversation at all, “Why are you doing this?”

“Doing what?” Thomas asked, eyes down and refusing to make eye contact, and Alex felt a spark of annoyance at the way he was feigning ignorance.

“You know what! This, all of this! You’re still helping me get my green card even though it’s actively hurting you. If the marriage wasn’t affecting you, it might make sense that you would feel bad enough to keep helping me, but it is affecting you! It destroyed your career. You should want to get as far from me as humanly possible,” Alex told him, starting to get worked up.

There was a few seconds where Thomas fumbled around for words, his calm starting to slip a bit. He seemed anxious, still not making eye contact, but eventually he managed to say, “I don’t have an answer.”

“Bullshit, you don’t have an answer!” Alex said immediately, getting even more frustrated, staring fixedly at Thomas even though he wouldn’t return the gaze. He wasn’t going to let this go, “You sacrificed a lot for me. People don’t just do that without a reason.”

Alex stared at him expectantly, and eventually Thomas glanced up, making eye contact for a split second. Then, seemingly as a result of the eye contact, Thomas’ cheeks went suddenly bright red and he looked away again, eyes suddenly widening like he was in shock.

“What?” Alex demanded, the expression on Thomas’ face making him nervous.

“I-” Thomas started, but he glanced up and made eye contact with Alex again, causing him to flush harder and cut himself off, “fuck. Sorry.”

Thomas stood up abruptly and immediately stepped into his room, shutting the door behind him. Alex stood up to follow, but stopped when he heard the distinct click of the lock.

He sat down again. He had absolutely no clue what to make of what had just happened. Was whatever the reason was really embarrassing enough to make him react like that and run away? Rather than satisfying his curiosity as he’d intended, all this conversation had done was make him more confused.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! It means a lot!


End file.
